* Two leaders put stamp of approval on Okinawa troops pact
* U.S. seeks to counterbalance China’s clout in region
By Matt Spetalnick
WASHINGTON, April 30 (Reuters) – President Barack Obama and
Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda pledged on Monday to strengthen
the U.S.-Japan security alliance, the latest effort to project
unity between Washington and its Asian partners as a
counterweight to China’s growing assertiveness in the region.
The two leaders put their stamp of approval on a
long-stalled agreement to sharply reduce the U.S. military
presence on the island of Okinawa, which could help ease the way
for Obama’s strategy of dispersing U.S. forces around the
western Pacific.
But the show of solidarity between Obama and Noda at the
White House was overshadowed by what was shaping up as a tense
diplomatic standoff between the United States and China over a
Chinese dissident believed to be under U.S. protection in
Beijing.
Underscoring the sensitivity over the case, Obama maintained
his administration’s silence on Chen Guangcheng’s fate when
asked about it at a joint news conference. But he went on to
press China to improve its human rights record, a longstanding
irritant in relations between the world’s two biggest economies.
The Obama administration used a visit by Noda and meetings
between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Defense Secretary
Leon Panetta and their counterparts from the Philippines to
showcase efforts to forge closer security ties with Asian
allies.
Starting with a trip late last year, Obama has touted a
“pivot” toward the economically dynamic Asia-Pacific region
widely seen as a U.S. effort to reassure nervous allies there of
the U.S. commitment as China flexes its economic and military
muscle.
“We have agreed to a new joint vision to guide our alliance
and help shape the Asia-Pacific for decades to come,” Obama said
after Oval Office talks with Noda.
Though a joint statement contained few specifics, Obama cast
it as a part of a broader security regional effort he unveiled
on a his Asia-Pacific trip in November. Closer military ties are
also being forged with the Philippines, Australia and Singapore.
MUTUAL DEFENSE
Clinton reaffirmed U.S. commitment to Philippine security
under a 60-year-old treaty of mutual defense and used a standoff
between Manila and Beijing over a disputed shoal in the Spratly
Islands to stake out a claim of U.S. interests in the region.
“As a Pacific power we have a national interest in freedom
of navigation, the maintenance of peace and stability, respect
for international law and the unimpeded lawful commerce across
our sea lanes,” she said, urging the countries to resolve their
dispute diplomatically.
The United States and the Philippines were looking at ways
to deepen their defense relationship and help Manila develop
what Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario called a “minimum
credible defense posture.” The Philippine military is seen as
one of the weakest among developing countries in the region.
Obama administration officials have left little doubt that
they want to show Americans they are working to face down a
rising competitive threat from China, which has become a key
issue at home as the president seeks re-election in November.
But Obama also sought on Monday to avoid further roiling the
diplomatic waters. “All of our actions are not designed to in
any way contain China,” Obama said of his talks with Noda, who
leads the world’s third largest economy.
“But they are designed to ensure that they (China) are part
of a broader international community in which rules, norms are
respected, in which all countries can prosper and succeed,”
Obama said.
Obama and Noda presented a unified front against North Korea
over its recent failed rocket launch and concerns that it may
test a nuclear device soon.
The two leaders met just days after the two countries
announced a revised agreement on streamlining the U.S. military
presence on Okinawa that will shift 9,000 Marines from the
southern Japanese island to Guam and other Asia-Pacific sites.
The new plan helps the allies work around the central but
still-unresolved dispute over moving the Futenma air base from a
crowded part of Okinawa to a new site that has vexed relations
for years.
Under the agreement, 5,000 Marines will go to Guam and the
rest to other sites such as Hawaii and Australia.
The agreement includes a $3.1 billion cash commitment from
Japan for the move to Guam as well as for developing joint
training ranges on Guam and on Tinian and Pagan in the
U.S.-controlled Northern Mariana Islands.
Snags over Okinawa had raised questions about the viability
of the Obama administration’s strategy of shifting U.S. forces
from other regions to the Asia-Pacific to deal with nuclear
saber-rattling by North Korea, the rapid military buildup of
China and territorial disputes in the South China Sea.
Obama welcomed the deal as serving the “broad-based
interests of our alliance as a whole, and Noda said it would
help the two countries “step up bilateral security and defense
cooperation in a creative manner.”
Washington wants Japan to loosen restrictions, enshrined in
its largely pacifist post-World War Two constitution, on
Japanese troop deployment outside its borders.
The Okinawa issue had been a major political headache at
home for Noda, Japan’s sixth prime minister in six years. He is
struggling to boost an economy that been anemic for a generation
and was hit hard by last year’s earthquake and tsunami that
triggered a nuclear disaster.
(Additional reporting by Samson Reiny, Laura MacInnis and
Alister Bull; Editing by Vicki Allen)
