Japan protests alleged sexual assault involving US military in Okinawa | Military news

The recent attacks occurred within months of each other, stoking local anger over the continued U.S. military presence.

Japan has filed a protest with the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo over at least two alleged cases of sexual assault involving U.S. service members on the southern Japanese island of Okinawa that were recently released public.

Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Masataka Okano met with U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel on Friday to call for disciplinary and preventive measures over the two attacks, which occurred months apart in December and May.

“Criminal cases and accidents involving U.S. military personnel cause great anxiety among local residents, and they should never happen,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi told reporters.

Prosecutors in Naha, Okinawa's capital, charged a 21-year-old U.S. Marine Corps member earlier this month with nonconsensual sex and assault, allegedly committed in May, Hayashi said.

An Okinawa police spokesperson said the woman was “bitten in the mouth” and it took her two weeks to fully recover. Media reported that she was also suffocated.

The case came to light just days after it was revealed that a 25-year-old US airman in Okinawa had been charged in March with raping a teenage girl three months earlier.

Brigadier General Nicholas Evans, commander of the 18th Wing at Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, said Thursday he was “deeply concerned” about the “seriousness” of the allegations. “I regret the anxiety this has caused,” he said.

He promised that the US military would fully cooperate with the investigation by local authorities and the courts.

Stirring up tensions

Both cases have sparked outrage and heightened tensions among local residents over U.S. military bases. Okinawans have long complained about accidents and crimes related to the bases, expressing anger over a lack of transparency.

The case involving the teenager reminds many Okinawans of the 1995 rape of a 12-year-old girl by three U.S. servicemen, which sparked mass protests against the heavy presence of American troops on the island.

This led to an agreement in 1996 between Japan and the United States to close a key American air base, although the project was delayed due to protests over the relocation site to another part of the island.

Some 50,000 U.S. troops are deployed to Japan under a bilateral security agreement, about half of them in Okinawa. The island's strategic role is seen as increasingly important for the Japan-US military alliance amid growing tensions with China.