The U.S. government on Tuesday delivered thinly veiled disparagement of the outspoken mayor of Osaka, Japan, who is under fire over a series of comments on "comfort women" and American troops in the region.
Mayor Toru Hashimoto, who co-heads the opposition Japan Restoration Party, canceled his trip to the U.S. next month amid growing criticism.
He recently said Japan's sexual enslavement of Korean and other Asian women during World War II was a necessity for its troops. And he urged U.S. soldiers in Japan to make use of the nation's legal sex industry to prevent their sex crimes.
The U.S. State Department refused to comment on his remarks.
"I'm not going to comment on every move or action of some local official," Patrick Ventrell, the department's deputy spokesman, said tersely said at a press briefing. "There are hundreds and thousands of mayor and local officials around the world. We can't respond to every single one."
The department was apparently attempting to play down Hashimoto's views, refusing to give them the dignity of a response.
Hashimoto has been accused of adding fuel to the anger of Koreans and people in some other Asian nations who believe Tokyo has yet to fully atone for its wartime atrocities.
There has been growing furor even in the U.S., which regards the "comfort women" issue as a grave infringement on human rights.
Bowing to such negative sentiment, Hashimoto announced that he would call off a trip to San Francisco and New York in mid-June to meet local politicians and business leaders.
"Traveling to the United States under the present circumstances will not bring any merit and will cause difficulties for local people," he said, according to local news reports. (Yonhap News)
