Mass rally in Japan against US base on Okinawa

Under a 2006 agreement with the United States, the US Marines’ Futenma base was to be moved to the coast.

Demanding that a US military base be moved off the island, around 100,000 people have attended a rally in Japan’s southern island of Okinawa

The row over the base has undermined relations between his centre-left Government and the US. Demonstrators want Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama to stick to an election pledge to remove it completely.

The Japanese have long been resentful of the massive US base on the island, which is home to more than half the 47,000 US Troops that was based in Japan.