Over 2,500 people staged a rally in the city of Okinawa on Sunday to protest sexual assaults on local girls by U.S. servicemen stationed in the prefecture of Okinawa.
They adopted a resolution demanding that the Japanese and U.S. governments apologize and compensate the victims, provide information promptly when such incidents occur, and revise the Japan-U.S. status of forces agreement, which governs U.S. troops stationed in Japan.
“Sexual violence that tramples on the dignity of women and children should never occur,” said Junko Iraha, chief of a local citizens’ group and a member of the rally’s organizing committee.
Okinawa Gov. Denny Tamaki said, “I feel keenly that we need to be stricter and speak louder about the situation in which many residents of the prefecture are forced to co-exist with U.S. military bases amid anxiety.”
Sorane Sakihama, a 22-year-old college student who spoke as a representative of young people, asked, “Do we have to be deprived of our youth because we were born in Okinawa and there are bases?”
The rally was broadcast live to other venues in Okinawa including Ishigaki and Miyakojima, and also distributed online. Participants wore yellow clothes and ribbons in honor of the mimosa flower, which symbolizes International Women’s Day.
It came to light in June this year that an Okinawa prosecutors’ office had indicted Brennon Washington, who belongs to the U.S. Air Force’s Kadena base in the prefecture, on charges of a sexual assault on a girl.
Authorities did not make the indictment public immediately. A series of sexual assaults by U.S. military personnel in Okinawa have since been revealed, sparking anger among residents of the prefecture.
