Japan should compromise to mend ties with Korea
President Moon Jae-in has made a conciliatory gesture toward Japan to mend soured ties with Tokyo. In a nationally televised speech marking the March 1 Independence Movement Day, he said that Korea was ready to discuss strengthening cooperation with Japan. However, it is hard to expect a breakthrough any time soon because the Asian neighbor shows no signs of compromise over historical issues.
Moon has reaffirmed a two-track approach in forging a future-oriented partnership with Tokyo while trying to resolve longstanding disputes over wartime atrocities committed by the former colonial power. "The only obstacle we have to overcome is that, sometimes, issues of the past cannot be separated from those of the future as they are intermingled with each other. This has impeded forward-looking development," he said.
Now the question is how to overcome such an obstacle. Moon said his government will always pursue "wise solutions" based on a victim-centered approach, vowing to restore the honor and dignity of victims of Japan's wartime atrocities such as forced labor and sex slavery. Yet he stopped short of specifying what those solutions are. What's clear is that he wants to resume talks with Japan to improve bilateral ties.
Moon's conciliatory move marks a meaningful change in his firm stance over Japan's past misdeeds. Seoul-Tokyo ties began to fray when the Moon administration tried to discredit the 2015 deal with the then nationalist Shinzo Abe government to resolve the thorny issue of "comfort women," who had been coerced into sex slavery for frontline Japanese troops from 1932 to the end of World War II. In 2018, the Supreme Court ordered Japanese firms to pay compensation to surviving South Korean victims of wartime forced labor, deteriorating ties.
The compensation ruling prompted Tokyo to limit the exports of key industrial materials necessary for Korean companies to make semiconductors and display panels. It also excluded Korea from its list of favored trading partners. The situation has aggravated further since a local court ordered the Japanese government last month to pay compensation to sex slavery victims.
The history-related issues cannot be resolved as long as Japan keeps refusing to acknowledge its crimes against humanity. It is irrational to claim that all reparations claims arising from Japan's 1910-45 colonial rule of Korea were settled by the 1965 treaty that normalized diplomatic relations between the two countries. Tokyo should sincerely apologize and pay compensation to the surviving victims of sex slavery and forced labor.
Now the Yoshihide Suga administration should positively respond to President Moon's offer for dialogue. It must take a flexible attitude toward finding a negotiated solution. Japan also needs to understand how crucial it is to have better ties with Korea to enhance bilateral cooperation and mutual prosperity. A Seoul-Tokyo partnership is also required to achieve North Korea's denuclearization and promote peace and stability in Northeast Asia. That's why U.S. President Joe Biden is actively pushing for trilateral cooperation with its two Asian allies.
Yet it is still difficult for Seoul and Tokyo to leave their fraught history behind once and for all, and move forward toward true reconciliation. Both sides should first make genuine efforts to restore mutual trust to better understand each other.
President Moon Jae-in has made a conciliatory gesture toward Japan to mend soured ties with Tokyo. In a nationally televised speech marking the March 1 Independence Movement Day, he said that Korea was ready to discuss strengthening cooperation with Japan. However, it is hard to expect a breakthrough any time soon because the Asian neighbor shows no signs of compromise over historical issues.
Moon has reaffirmed a two-track approach in forging a future-oriented partnership with Tokyo while trying to resolve longstanding disputes over wartime atrocities committed by the former colonial power. "The only obstacle we have to overcome is that, sometimes, issues of the past cannot be separated from those of the future as they are intermingled with each other. This has impeded forward-looking development," he said.
Now the question is how to overcome such an obstacle. Moon said his government will always pursue "wise solutions" based on a victim-centered approach, vowing to restore the honor and dignity of victims of Japan's wartime atrocities such as forced labor and sex slavery. Yet he stopped short of specifying what those solutions are. What's clear is that he wants to resume talks with Japan to improve bilateral ties.
Moon's conciliatory move marks a meaningful change in his firm stance over Japan's past misdeeds. Seoul-Tokyo ties began to fray when the Moon administration tried to discredit the 2015 deal with the then nationalist Shinzo Abe government to resolve the thorny issue of "comfort women," who had been coerced into sex slavery for frontline Japanese troops from 1932 to the end of World War II. In 2018, the Supreme Court ordered Japanese firms to pay compensation to surviving South Korean victims of wartime forced labor, deteriorating ties.
The compensation ruling prompted Tokyo to limit the exports of key industrial materials necessary for Korean companies to make semiconductors and display panels. It also excluded Korea from its list of favored trading partners. The situation has aggravated further since a local court ordered the Japanese government last month to pay compensation to sex slavery victims.
The history-related issues cannot be resolved as long as Japan keeps refusing to acknowledge its crimes against humanity. It is irrational to claim that all reparations claims arising from Japan's 1910-45 colonial rule of Korea were settled by the 1965 treaty that normalized diplomatic relations between the two countries. Tokyo should sincerely apologize and pay compensation to the surviving victims of sex slavery and forced labor.
Now the Yoshihide Suga administration should positively respond to President Moon's offer for dialogue. It must take a flexible attitude toward finding a negotiated solution. Japan also needs to understand how crucial it is to have better ties with Korea to enhance bilateral cooperation and mutual prosperity. A Seoul-Tokyo partnership is also required to achieve North Korea's denuclearization and promote peace and stability in Northeast Asia. That's why U.S. President Joe Biden is actively pushing for trilateral cooperation with its two Asian allies.
Yet it is still difficult for Seoul and Tokyo to leave their fraught history behind once and for all, and move forward toward true reconciliation. Both sides should first make genuine efforts to restore mutual trust to better understand each other.
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