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thedrifter
10-26-07, 06:19 AM
Japan won't arrest US Marines over rape allegation: reports

Thu Oct 25, 11:46 PM ET

Japanese police investigating a young woman's allegations that four US Marines gang-raped her have decided not to arrest the servicemen, reports said Friday.

Police decided against an arrest because there are inconsistencies in the woman's story, Jiji Press and Kyodo News agencies said, citing anonymous sources.

There have been conflicting reports, including over the age of the woman involved in the alleged incident on October 14 in Hiroshima.

Media reports earlier said that the four Marines met the woman, who was in her early 20s or late teens, at a public place and that she told police they gang-raped her in a car.

Hiroshima police declined to comment on the report. US forces in Japan have said that the four Marines were being investigated at their base in Iwakuni, south of Hiroshima.

The United States stations troops in Japan under a security alliance, but there has often been friction with communities that host the military. Thousands took to the streets in 1995 after three US servicemen raped a 12-year-old girl on the southern island of Okinawa.

Under a diplomatic agreement, Japan can seek to arrest US military personnel accused of wrongdoing.

Hiroshima, where the alleged incident first took place, is best known for suffering the world's first atomic bomb, dropped by the United States at the end of World War II.

The US embassy said in an earlier statement that the United States was "cooperating fully with Japanese authorities."

"The US forces in Japan and the US government are committed to maintaining the highest standards of discipline for US military personnel in Japan," it said.

Ellie