Japan and South Korea on Sunday agreed to take forward ties and move past lingering historical disputes, pledging to transform a relationship that could have broad implications for the region.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Sunday became the first Japanese leader to visit Seoul in 12 years. The visit followed a trip to Japan in March by South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol.
What has been dubbed “shuttle diplomacy” promises to transform ties between two U.S. allies that have been bogged down over historical issues, chiefly Japan’s reluctance to apologise for atrocities committed during its occupation. Both have, however, been brought together by shared concerns not only over North Korea’s nuclear programme but over China’s regional muscle-flexing.
Despite differences over Japan’s wartime actions, which remain an emotive issue in South Korea and China, President Yoon has risked domestic political fallout by making a case for moving forward and arguing that while historical issues continue to be resolved, relations still needed to look to the future.
To that end, both sides in March agreed to come up with a fund to compensate South Koreans who suffered under Japanese forced labour programmes.
“For me personally, my heart hurts when I think of the many people who endured terrible suffering and grief under the difficult circumstances of the time,” Mr. Kishida said on Sunday, expressing regret but stopping short of an apology, which many Koreans have been expecting.
Mr. Yoon has faced some criticism at home for moving forward on the history question without extracting more from Japan, either by way of compensation from its companies or with deeper apologies from Tokyo. Japanese leaders have themselves been wary of agreeing to either, considering their own domestic political considerations, with persisting strands of wartime denialism among some Japanese conservatives.
Under the March agreement, the compensation will be paid by a joint fund, and not, as many in South Korea had demanded, funded entirely by Japanese companies, two of which had, in 2018, faced legal action in South Korea over their record during the 1910-45 occupation. Tens of thousands of Korean women were also forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese Army.
Mr. Yoon’s March trip broke the ice, and took forward a rapprochement that both leaders have backed strongly. The current visit has seen both sides explore closer economic and defence ties. The Japanese leader also invited Mr. Yoon to the G-7 Summit to be hosted in Tokyo later this month, which would have been an unlikely prospect in the recent past.
Given the weight of history, however, hurdles remain. “Japanese leaders have long repeated the mantra that everything had already been settled through the 1965 deal and refused to offer a formal apology in specific terms about Japan’s wartime crimes against Koreans,” the Korea Herald said in a Sunday editorial.
“In fact, Kishida and his predecessors have reflected the general sentiment of the Japanese people, many of whom are hostile toward Korea for demanding an apology and compensation. For Koreans, it is hard to understand why Japan refuses to face its own past filled with violent aggression... Kishida also needs to clear bilateral obstacles in other fields, such as restoring Korea’s white list status in trade, before accelerating shuttle diplomacy to jointly confront North Korea’s nuclear missile threats....The ball is now in Kishida’s court.”
