US troops on Okinawa face curfew, liquor ban

TOKYO — American forces on Okinawa were barred on Wednesday from drinking alcohol for 48 hours and faced a 30-day curfew after the murder of a woman allegedly committed by a United States Marine. The case has triggered outrage in Japan, where any crime involving US forces has long inflamed criticism of the troops’ presence. Genta Koja, the governor of Okinawa — where the bulk of the 54,000 US military personnel in Japan are based — told Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi during a meeting in the capital Tokyo on Wednesday that there was an “urgent need to reduce base-related burdens” on the southern island chain, without providing specifics. “The robbery-murder this time hugely shocked local residents,” he said, requesting a committee be convened swiftly to discuss the issue. Earlier, Benjamin T. Watson, Okinawa area coordinator and commanding general of the III Marine Expeditionary Force, announced a “complete prohibition of alcohol consumption on or off base” starting on Wednesday. Watson said the 48-hour period — described as “an operational pause” — would give commanders the time to lead training with all service members on “standards, discipline, and our responsibilities as members of the Okinawan community.” Operations will cease during this period and “we will not allow off-base liberty,” said Watson in a statement on X on Tuesday night. The lieutenant general, the most senior US military figure on Okinawa, also announced a 30-day “period of reflection” beginning on Friday. “During this period, we will implement a curfew in which liberty will expire at 2400 for all hands, meaning you must be back on base in your assigned quarters or at your off-base domicile from midnight to 0500,” he said. Police said on Sunday that a US Marine stationed on Okinawa was arrested on suspicion of killing a 39-year-old woman at a hotel in the city of Naha and stealing her wallet. Local media reported she was choked to death and that the Marine is denying the allegations. ‘Deep anxiety’ Crimes committed by US personnel have been a thorn in relations between the close security allies. Koja, who won Okinawa’s gubernatorial election last month, is the island’s first leader in 12 years who approved a contentious US military base relocation plan. The central government plan is to keep the US Marine Corps’ Futenma air base on Okinawa’s main island, but move it to a less populated location. Earlier on Wednesday, Koja met Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi in Tokyo, where he said the murder case had “caused deep anxiety” among Okinawa’s residents. “The prefectural government has repeatedly demanded that the US military take measures to prevent a recurrence every time an incident occurs, but the fact that such an incident has happened again forces us to conclude that discipline within the US forces and their human rights education are not functioning at all,” he told Koizumi. Koizumi said he would “advance discussions with the United States on how to implement effective measures” to prevent such incidents from happening. Last year, a Japanese court sentenced a US Marine accused of choking and attempting to rape a woman in her 20s to seven years in prison. In 2017, a former US Marine and civilian military base worker was sentenced to life in prison for the rape and murder of a local woman in Okinawa. The same year, US Forces Japan banned all personnel from consuming alcohol after an intoxicated US Marine crashed his vehicle into a minitruck, killing its 61-year-old driver.