Mageshima island in Kagoshima Prefecture. The Defense Ministry planned to purchase the islet as a U.S. military field carrier landing practice site. Tanegashima island is in the background. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Negotiations by the government to purchase a small island in Kagoshima Prefecture for U.S. military field carrier landing practice hit a roadblock after the owner canceled the sale.

Taston Airport, the Tokyo-based development company that owns 99 percent of Mageshima island, notified the Defense Ministry of the termination of sales negotiations in a letter dated May 7, according to sources.

Despite twists and turns in the negotiations, the company agreed in January to sell the 8-square-kilometer island to the ministry for 16 billion yen ($145 million).

A formal contract was expected to be inked as early as spring.

But in the May 7 letter addressed to Yoshitoshi Nakamura, director-general of the ministry’s Bureau of Local Cooperation, the company took umbrage at the ministry’s refusal to meet the new president, Isao Tateishi.

The company said that made it impossible for it to confirm details of the agreement on the sale, according to the sources.

“We understand that the ministry has severed its relations with us and that led us to scrap our policy to sell the island and switch to another option,” the letter apparently said.

It gave no details of other options.

The U.S. military currently uses Iwoto island, formerly known as Iwojima island, for carrier practice landings and takeoffs.

Because the island lies about 1,250 km south of Tokyo, U.S. authorities called for site closer to the main island of Japan.

Japan and the United States agreed in 2011 that the U.S. military could stage the drills on Mageshima, located about 12 km west of Tanegashima in Kagoshima Prefecture.

Despite the January agreement, relations between Taston Airport and the ministry soured after the company president was replaced by Tateishi in February.

In the initial stage of sales negotiations, a large gap emerged in the appraisal of the value of the island between the company headed by Tateishi and the ministry.

Although the ministry made an offer of about 4.5 billion yen, Taston Airport held out for more than 40 billion yen.

A breakthrough in negotiations came in October when Kaoru Tateishi replaced his father as president.

Kaoru was dismissed as president in an emergency shareholders’ meeting in February following the sales deal reached in January, sparking fears the sales talks could snarl again.

His dismissal followed numerous complaints by company officials about Kaoru’s handling of the Mageshima sale.