At 15:50 on Wednesday 23 March, Rt. Hon. Mr William Hague, First Secretary of State and Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, paid a visit to the Japanese Embassy in the UK to sign a Book of Condolence for the victims of the Tohoku-Pacific Ocean Earthquake. Mr Hague wrote in the Book of Condolence: "I send our deepest condolences and constant thoughts to the people of Japan, whose courage, dignity and fortitude we greatly admire. We will always remain close to you, and do all we can to help in the recovery from this terrible and tragic event."
As a message to people in Japan, Mr Hague stated: "We have all in Britain been deeply shocked by the events, the earthquake and the tsunami, but I think it's also very true to say that we have admired the courage and the dignity and the fortitude of the people of Japan, particularly in recent days, as we have seen how people have tried to recover from this catastrophe. We have sent the help that we can send with our search and rescue teams and if there is any other help that we can provide in the future then we are keen to do that. We will always try to give further help. We particularly admire at the moment the brave engineers who are working to deal with the problems at the nuclear power plant at Fukushima and again we offer any help that we can give in nuclear matters, although clearly there's a great deal of expertise on that in Japan and so our thoughts have been with the people of Japan over these last 12 days since the earthquake. I think British people have felt this very profoundly. We have a strong identity with Japan and feel a close relationship with Japan and so this has deeply affected people in Britain but we will try to bring our nations even closer over the next few years and we will do our part to show that the international community will do everything it can to assist the Japanese people in these terrible circumstances."
After signing the Book of Condolence, the Foreign Secretary had a brief conversation with Ambassador Hayashi. Noting with appreciation that Mr Hague's action followed that of T.R.H. The Duke and Duchess of Gloucester (on behalf of Her Majesty The Queen), Prime Minister David Cameron and Foreign Office Ministers of State Jeremy Browne and Lord Howell, Mr Hayashi mentioned how moved he was by the British Government's expression of condolence and its willingness to extend assistance to Japan. Mr Hague voiced the British Government's wish to act in support of the people affected by the disaster and in tackling the issue of the damaged nuclear plant in Fukushima, and hoped to see UK-Japan relations become even stronger in tackling the issue on hand as well as in the wider context.
He recalled that he had visited Japan immediately after taking office and had already had a telephone conversation with Japan's new Foreign Minister, Mr Takeaki Matsumoto, as well as meeting him at the recent G8 foreign ministers' meeting in Paris, and wished to continue working closely with him on addressing the various global issues of common concern.
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