U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and U.S. Pacific forces commander Adm. William Fallon have offered their condolences and expressed regret over the murder last week of a Japanese woman, allegedly committed by a U.S. sailor in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, Foreign Ministry officials said Thursday.

Chikao Kawai, director general of the ministry's North American Affairs Bureau, told Kanagawa Gov. Shigefumi Matsuzawa and Yokosuka Mayor Ryoichi Kabaya that Rumsfeld and Fallon had conveyed their condolences to the victim's family through the central government, the officials said.

In the meeting Thursday with Kawai, Matsuzawa and Kabaya urged the state to call for stricter discipline of U.S. military personnel and to take measures to prevent similar incidents.

U.S. Air Force Gen. Bruce Wright, head of the U.S. forces in Japan, also visited the Foreign Ministry and offered an apology Thursday to Kawai over the murder and robbery.

Wright expressed condolences to the victim's family, the citizens of Yokosuka and the Japanese people as a whole. He promised to make his best efforts to tighten discipline among the U.S. military personnel and to do everything possible to prevent a recurrence, the officials said.

Police last Saturday arrested William Reese, a 21-year-old sailor stationed aboard the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk, on suspicion of killing Yoshie Sato, 56, and stealing 15,000 yen in Yokosuka on Jan. 3.