Sunday’s Asahi wrote that the Defense Ministry recently held briefings for residents of the regions of Akita and Yamaguchi where the Aegis Ashore missile defense platform had been expected to be deployed at local SDF installations before the initiative was unilaterally canceled by then Defense Minister Kono 18 months ago. The daily said that although the officials providing the briefings repeatedly apologized, they failed to respond to queries from the participants on why their communities were chosen as candidate sites in the first place. The Akita residents were also reportedly upset that they were only given one briefing while the Yamaguchi residents received five.