TOKYO (AFP)--A U.S. warship docked Thursday in Nagasaki to the protests of residents and a boycott by local leaders who said the visit was in poor taste in a city obliterated by a U.S. atomic bomb.
The USS Blue Ridge, which is stationed in Yokosuka near Tokyo, sailed to Nagasaki with a stated goal of promoting friendship between Japan and the U.S.
Hundreds of residents including atomic bomb survivors chanted, "We are opposed to the port call!" as the 19,600-ton vessel arrived in the southwestern city.
"We don't want to see the U.S. flag flying at this port and this feeling will not change until the United States takes a policy towards the elimination of nuclear weapons," Osamu Yoshitomi, an official at Nagasaki city, said.
Nagasaki's mayor and regional governor both refused to take part in the welcome ceremony after unsuccessfully asking Japanese and U.S. authorities to cancel the visit.
The U.S. stations more than 40,000 troops in Japan under a post-World War II alliance. Under a 1960 agreement, local authorities don't have the right to refuse U.S. warships' port calls.
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