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Campbell leaves for Japan today

The ink isn’t even dry on the swearing-in signature of Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Kurt Campbell, but he’s headed off to Tokyo today. Good timing all around, because the new Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama was just officially chosen following the stunning Aug. 31 ascension of the Democratic Party ...

The ink isn't even dry on the swearing-in signature of Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Kurt Campbell, but he's headed off to Tokyo today.

The ink isn’t even dry on the swearing-in signature of Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Kurt Campbell, but he’s headed off to Tokyo today.

Good timing all around, because the new Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama was just officially chosen following the stunning Aug. 31 ascension of the Democratic Party of Japan, unseating the ruling Liberal Democratic Party for only the second time since 1955.

A State Department official told The Cable that Campbell will arrive Thursday, meet with Japanese officials of the new government for two days, and then fly back to the U.S. on Saturday. Accompanying him will be his new Special Assistant Mark Tesone, who previously worked in the shop of under secretary for political affairs William Burns.

While there is no set agenda, North Korea and the potential trip there of Amb. Stephen Bosworth will probably discussed, the official said.

"I wouldn’t be surprised if that came up."

Other topics that seem ripe for conversation are the issue of whether Japan will continue its fuel aid to coalition forces in Afghanistan and whether or not U.S.-Japan base relocation deals now need to be renegotiated.

Japan watchers are also looking to see whether Campbell will speak more regarding the bad optics surrounding Hatoyama’s recent essay in the Japanese magazine Voice, which may or may not have been poorly translated when it was excerpted in the New York Times.

A roundtable with Japanese media is in the works, but no public speaking events are currently scheduled.

Here’s everything you need you need to know about the new Japanese cabinet.

Josh Rogin covers national security and foreign policy and writes the daily Web column The Cable. His column appears bi-weekly in the print edition of The Washington Post. He can be reached for comments or tips at josh.rogin@foreignpolicy.com.

Previously, Josh covered defense and foreign policy as a staff writer for Congressional Quarterly, writing extensively on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, U.S.-Asia relations, defense budgeting and appropriations, and the defense lobbying and contracting industries. Prior to that, he covered military modernization, cyber warfare, space, and missile defense for Federal Computer Week Magazine. He has also served as Pentagon Staff Reporter for the Asahi Shimbun, Japan's leading daily newspaper, in its Washington, D.C., bureau, where he reported on U.S.-Japan relations, Chinese military modernization, the North Korean nuclear crisis, and more.

A graduate of George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, Josh lived in Yokohama, Japan, and studied at Tokyo's Sophia University. He speaks conversational Japanese and has reported from the region. He has also worked at the House International Relations Committee, the Embassy of Japan, and the Brookings Institution.

Josh's reporting has been featured on CNN, MSNBC, C-Span, CBS, ABC, NPR, WTOP, and several other outlets. He was a 2008-2009 National Press Foundation's Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellow, 2009 military reporting fellow with the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism and the 2011 recipient of the InterAction Award for Excellence in International Reporting. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C. Twitter: @joshrogin

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