Carter apologizes to Japan over murder of Okinawan woman
US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has extended “sincere” apologies to his Japanese counterpart over the death of a local woman who was killed by a US military base staff member in Okinawa.
In a phone conversation with Japanese Defense Minister Gen Nakatani, Carter “conveyed his sadness and his regret” and “expressed his sympathies to the people of Japan,” Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said in a statement on Sunday.
The Pentagon chief told Nakatani that Washington was ready to fully cooperate with Tokyo in the case in order to hold accountable the perpetrator.
Cook added that Carter and Nakatani were scheduled to discuss the security ties between the two countries when they meet next month during the upcoming Shangri-La Dialogue.
Kenneth Franklin Shinzato, a former US Marine, was arrested on Friday for murdering Rina Shimabukuro, who had been missing since late April and her body was recently found in a weed-covered area in southern Okinawa.
Shinzato, who lives in southern Okinawa and works at the US Air Force's Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, was charged with the crime after police found DNA matching the dead woman's in his car.
Following the incident, Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida summoned US Ambassador Caroline Kennedy and handed her an official letter of protest.
"It is extremely regrettable that the very cruel and atrocious case occurred," Kishida told Kennedy, according to Japanese media.
Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe also expressed “outrage” following Franklin’s arrest.
More than half of the 47,000 US military forces in Japan are stationed in Okinawa, and rapes and other crimes by service members have sparked local protests in the past.
Back in 2013, two American sailors admitted to raping a woman in Okinawa a year earlier in a case that sparked huge anti-US sentiments in Japan.
In 1995, the abduction and rape of a 12-year-old girl by three US servicemen triggered huge protests, prompting Washington to pledge efforts to strengthen troop discipline to prevent such crimes and reduce the US footprint on the island.
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