The government denied Friday that the United States had offered to return to Japan land occupied by its Futenma Air Station in Okinawa Prefecture without a relocation site.
"The U.S. side has never sounded us out" about such a posEsibility, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda told a news conference, rejecting a report in the Mainichi Shimbun newspaper.
Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi and Defense Agency Director General Shigeru Ishiba also flatly denied the reEport, which states that the U.S. may return the base in GinoEwan on Okinawa Island and integrate its functions into the nearby Kadena Air Base run by the U.S. Air Force.
Japan and the U.S. agreed in 1996 that Washington will reEturn the Futenma airfield on condition that a relocation site is built. Japan has decided to build an airfield on reclaimed land off the city of Nago on the island.
"There is no change" to the agreement, Fukuda said.