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Japan’s Diplomatic Bluebook for 2016 reportedly describes South Korea as the country’s “most important neighbor sharing strategic interests.”
A draft copy of the 2016 edition, which awaits a Cabinet decision on Apr. 15, was examined on Apr. 4 by Kyodo News. According to the news agency‘s report, the book will describe South Korea as Japan’s “most important neighbor sharing security interests” and positive relations as “essential to the peace and stability of the Asia-Pacific region.”

Japan’s 2015 Defense Bluebook

The draft also notes “major progress in relations as a result of the military comfort women agreement,” a reference to an agreement reached between Seoul and Tokyo last Dec. 28 on the issue of women drafted to serve as sexual slaves to the Japanese military.

But language referring to South Korea as “a neighbor sharing [Japan’s] core values” - included in previous Bluebooks as recently as 2014 - was reportedly omitted for a second straight year.

Analysts said the new approach from Tokyo suggests it is emphasizing South Korea as a “business partner” that it has to work with on shared security issues involving China and the North Korean nuclear program, rather than a “friend” sharing its values. The clear implication is that ties have returned to the period before the joint “partnership declaration” of Oct. 1998, which was made by then-South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi on the understanding that both sides shared the same core values.

The content of the new Bluebook was foreshadowed by remarks made by current Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in a Jan. 22 administrative policy speech. At the time, Abe said Tokyo had “confirmed the final and irreversible resolution of the comfort women issue with South Korea late last year and put an end to a longstanding issue.”

“We plan to build a cooperative relationship for a new era with our most important neighbor sharing strategic interests in order to ensure peace and prosperity in East Asia,” he continued.

By Gil Yun-hyung, Tokyo correspondent

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