Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa expressed his readiness Wednesday to visit the United States next week if progress is not seen on the relocation of the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>'We might have to go to the United States next week, depending on how things go,' Kitazawa said.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>A meeting of a Japan-U.S. bilateral working group set up to find a solution to the relocation issue was scheduled for later this week.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>'It will be debated at the working level first and then Foreign Minister –

Okada and I will join it, if necessary, to hold ministerial-level discussions," Kitazawa said in a speech at the National Defense Academy in Japan in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture.

"It would not be difficult (for the two countries) to share how things should be during the course of last-minute negotiations," he said.

Kitazawa at the same time voiced concerns that the outcome of the bilateral talks could have a negative impact on the partnership of the three-party ruling coalition.

On Tuesday, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirofumi Hirano said an agreement among the three parties — the Democratic Party of Japan, the Social Democratic Party and Kokumin Shinto (People's New Party) — is indispensable in settling the issue.

The DPJ-led government, launched in September after the party's election victory in late August, is reviewing a 2006 deal between Tokyo and Washington to relocate the Futenma facility to a less populated part of Okinawa.

Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has suggested the facility could be moved out of the prefecture, but has yet to make clear his stance on the matter. The SDP advocates moving the base out of the prefecture.

Kitazawa and Okada have said they aim to reach a conclusion at the bilateral meeting by the end of the year.