Saying it has "served a certain mission," the organizing committee of a major rally against the deployment last year of MV-22 Ospreys to a U.S. air base in Okinawa announced Friday it will disband.
Comprising representatives of the Okinawa Prefectural Assembly and other municipal bodies, the committee held the protest rally in Ginowan on Sept. 9, attracting an estimated 100,000 participants. The organizers took issue with the tilt-rotor transport aircraft's spotty safety record.
However, the Ospreys were controversially deployed to U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma in a crowded residential district of Ginowan the following month.
At Friday's committee meeting, some members called for creating another entity to continue fighting against the deployment of the MV-22s at the Futenma base.