hankyoreh

The foreign ministers of Korea and Japan met on Jeju Island over the weekend and demonstrated that developing relations between the two countries is not going to be easy. Much was said but little was agreed upon, and the difficult issues remain unresolved.

Japan was unwilling to give anything regarding its position on the past. When it came to the issue of the so-called comfort women, Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso said only that nothing has changed about his position accepting the Kono Statement. Not only did he not apologize for the repeated "reckless remarks" (mangeon) on the issue by high-ranking Japanese officials as of late - he didn’t even mention this situation at all. Regarding recent revelations that the Japanese government was involved in moving the memorial tablets of Class A war criminals to Yasukuni Shrine, he skirted the issue by saying it was "the shrine authorities’ decision." He evaded the issue of how Japanese high school textbooks claim the Dokdo Islets belong to Japan by saying the government can’t intervene on the issue since they’re not government-commissioned books. Meanwhile, Aso claimed that "historical questions must not be mixed with political ones." It was like with one hand he distorted the wrongs of the past and with the other reached out for a handshake, all the while claiming that the two hands are different.

Korea proposed foreign ministerial talks between Korea, China, and Japan, and Japan proposed resuming security talks between the two countries and dialogue between the North American desks at each country’s foreign ministries. The difference between these proposals is significant in terms of the mechanics of relations in Northeast Asia, because the view is that Korea is trying to put some substance into a structure for common discussion among the key nations of the region, whereas Japan is trying to constrain China by bringing Korea into the U.S.-Japan alliance. It goes without saying that there has to be balanced contact between the nations of Northeast Asia if we are going to advance the Northeast Asian community initiative we desire.

Japan is a country so close, and yet so distant. It is relatively close economically and socially, but it is not so close in terms of how it views the past and in terms of diplomacy and military concerns. Many Koreans think conflict between the two countries will increase the more Japan turns to the political right. Distortions of the past by Japanese political elements are making a decisive contribution to these suspicions. What the recent foreign ministerial talks demonstrated once again is that unless Japan tries to change on its own, there will be limits to how much relations can develop in the future.



Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]