TOKYO — Japanese police on Thursday dragged away a group of elderly protesters trying to block construction of a US military base in Okinawa, the latest flare-up in tensions over the bitterly opposed project.
Hundreds of local Okinawans, most of them elderly, were staging a sit-in protest with their arms linked in a bid to block trucks and other construction vehicles.
In response, police dragged away some demonstrators including physically picking up frail activists, television images showed.
"Okinawa doesn't belong to the United States or the central government," a visibly angry Hiroshi Ashitomi, 69, told the Jiji Press news agency.
The clash comes days after the Japanese government overturned a move by Okinawa's governor to stop work on the US base relocation site.
The proposal to move the Futenma air base, first mooted in 1996, has become the focus of anger among locals, who insist it should be shut and a replacement built elsewhere in Japan or overseas.
Read the full story at DefenseNews