Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda ran into a brick wall Tuesday after asking the opposition to support a special antiterrorism bill that would let the Maritime Self-Defense Force resume its mission providing fuel and water to multinational naval ships in the Indian Ocean.
With only 11 days left before the end of the extraordinary Diet session, both the ruling and opposition camps began deliberating the bill in earnest at an Upper House panel. But Democratic Party of Japan members of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee refused to budge on Fukuda's request.
They also demanded that the government put priority on "squeezing the pus out of the scandal-tainted Defense Ministry."