Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto said Saturday he will retract his remark that U.S. servicemen in Okinawa should use the prefecture's adult entertainment industry to avoid committing sex offenses against local residents, and will apologize to the American people and military.
"My choice of words was inappropriate," Hashimoto, who coheads Nippon Ishin no Kai (Japan Restoration Party) with former Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara, said on a TV political talk show.
He said he would like to make the apology at a news conference scheduled for Monday in Tokyo at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan.