By DAIZO TERAMOTO/ Staff Writer
June 21, 2021 at 18:35 JST
Takamatsu Gushiken, center, chats with a local resident during his hunger strike in front of the Okinawa prefectural government building in Naha on June 20. (Daizo Teramoto)
NAHA--A man is on a second hunger strike here to stop the central government’s plan to use soil containing remains of people killed in the 1945 Battle of Okinawa to build a U.S. military base.
Takamatsu Gushiken, 67, began his protest in front of the Okinawa prefectural government building on June 19, to raise awareness of the matter ahead of June 23, the memorial day to remember the battle's victims.
He staged a similar hunger strike in front of the building in March.
As part of a project to reclaim land in waters off the Henoko district of Nago to build a new U.S. base to take over the functions of U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma in Ginowan, the central government intends to procure landfill material from the southern part of the main Okinawa island.
Both Nago and Ginowan are in Okinawa Prefecture.
“The use of soil from the southern part of the island for the land reclamation work is tantamount to defaming the dead,” said Gushiken, the representative of Gamafuya, a group of volunteers who search for the remains of the war dead in the prefecture.
He is urging the prefectural government not to approve the central government’s proposal to use the soil since remains of those who died in the fighting are still being recovered.
The Defense Ministry made the proposal to use the soil in a request it submitted in April 2020 to the prefectural government for a change to the reclamation plan due to the soft seabed off Henoko, which needed shoring up for the project to continue.
A 79-year-old Naha resident who lost her father and relatives in the Battle of Okinawa signed a petition to show her support for Gushiken.
“I’m still waiting for the remains of my father and others to be discovered,” she said. “It’s unthinkable that the central government plans to use the soil for the reclamation work.”
Gushiken will move to the Peace Memorial Park in Itoman’s Mabuni, Okinawa Prefecture, on June 21 to continue his hunger strike until June 23.
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