Japan Korea
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Dec. 13, 2009
Japan must apologize for rule over Korea: Ozawa
SEOUL (Kyodo) Ichiro Ozawa, secretary general of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan, said
Saturday that Japan must apologize for an "unfortunate period" in its relations with South Korea,
referring to Tokyo's colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula from 1910 to 1945.
"There was an unfortunate period in modern history and it is a historical fact that Japan and the
Japanese people must apologize for," Ozawa, who is in South Korea, said in a speech on bilateral ties
at Kookmin University in Seoul.
Ozawa at the same time emphasized the need for the two countries to move forward on bilateral ties
without being bound by the past.
"We need to make efforts to (build) goodwill and a friendly relationship, as well as solidarity by
overcoming past issues," he said.
The former DPJ president reiterated his support for giving permanent foreign residents in Japan,
including ethnic Koreans with special permanent residence status, the right to vote in local elections.
"We still have to settle some issues that remain unresolved in Japan and South Korea," he said.
"Japan is in a position to make proposals in a positive manner on the matter."
Ozawa, who is believed to wield considerable influence over the new government, is in Seoul after
visiting China for two days through Friday.
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June 17, 2001
TOKYO FOOD FILE: On a mission from Korea
By ROBBIE SWINNERTON
Kimchi is not just a daily food for Koreans, it's a potent symbol of national identity. Hence the outcry
when the news broke of Japanese companies marketing ersatz versions not made according to the
traditional process. This was sacrilege on the same order of trying to pass off carbonated grape juice
as champagne.
The first floor of Saikabo
It was not a storm in a pickle crock. But instead of street demonstrations and the burning of effigies, a
wiser strategy was adopted. Japan obviously needed to be lifted from its benighted ignorance of the
true nature of kimchi. This, above all, is the mission statement for Saikabo, arguably the most
authentically "Korean" restaurant in all of Tokyo.
Much more than just an eating place, Saikabo serves as an unofficial kimchi cultural center. It has a
street-level retail store, where you can pick up half a dozen different kinds of kimchi as well as other
staples brought in from South Korea. The room at the back displays artifacts and photos of rural life,
which you can contemplate as you lunch on simple dishes of rice and noodles.
The restaurant itself, up on the second floor, is less self-consciously didactic. With its low ceiling,
simple wooden chairs and tables, and latticed wooden screens over the window, it's as relaxed and
enjoyable as a rural hostelry in Cheju or Kyongju. The walls are adorned with paintings and folksy
artifacts; the tables are set with spoons and chopsticks of silvery metal.
The waitresses wear simple, cotton work clothes, not the bright silk robes usually thought of as the
national costume. Saikabo celebrates the vigorous culture of ordinary country folk.
The format of a meal here is much like eating at a Japanese izakaya. First some appetizers with your
drinks; then a main dish or two, to be shared in communal fashion by all present; and finally soup, rice
or noodles and some more pickles (these are eaten throughout the meal).
You have to start with a plate of mixed kimchi -- cubes of kakuteki daikon, sliced cucumbers and
mounds of classic cabbage kimchi, all redolent with the searching pungency that derives only from
proper, longtime fermentation. Not all Korean pickles are spicy, though. Try also the manul janachi, a
whole clove of garlic pickled not in chili but dark vinegar, its sharpness tempered with a distinct underflavor of anise and other spices.
Another popular starter is kimkui, crisp squares of laver (nori) seaweed given a rich coating of fragrant
sesame oil. This may never supplant corn chips in your affections, but you know it's much healthier.
Everyone loves chijimi, those tasty pancakes known here as Korean okonomiyaki. At Saikabo they are
made with so much egg they are more like fluffy deep-pan omelets. Containing tasty chunks of squid
and plenty of nira greens, these are strong contenders as the best in the city.
Our first main dish, chapch'ae, consisted of dangmyon (harusame) noodles with chopped vegetables
and thin pieces of beef. Much like a Chinese stir-fry, it was well seasoned with black pepper rather
than chili.
The centerpiece of our meal was pulgoki -- not the dish that has become the yakiniku standard, but
more akin to sukiyaki. Beef, clear noodles and a good mixture of vegetables (cabbage, green onions,
nira, onions and shiitake mushrooms) are piled onto a round, concave pan of yellow bronze placed
over an open burner. As the ingredients cook, they are pushed down into the seasoned cooking stock
around the rim of the pan, then picked out with chopsticks.
Although most people slake their thirst with beer, for the full Korean experience, the drink of choice
has to be makkoli. This milky-white, unfiltered rice wine (listed as doburoku on the menu but not as
alcoholic as Japanese sake) soothes and comforts throats left stinging from unaccustomed chili heat.
It goes perfectly with Korean food, in just the same way that lassi is the best accompaniment for Indian
curries.
Other main dishes include ginseng chicken (samgetang) and kotchan chongol, a nabe-style hot pot
with an angry-red soup guaranteed to put hairs on your chest. But if it's chili heat you are craving, look
no further than the yukkejang soup, a spicy, red-hot preparation made with morsels of beef stomach
and an invigorating vegetable-laden broth that can also be served over rice if you choose.
This is power food, the fuel of farmers and fishermen, and a strong antidote for the summer lassitude.
When it comes to serving authentic Korean food, few places in town are as uncompromising as
Saikabo. So intent is it on its mission, that no dessert of any kind is offered (though you'd think there
would be massive demand). If a cup of grain tea seems inadequate, you can pick up some fruit juice
downstairs as you leave.
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July 7, 2002
We love Korea (we just love Beckham more)
By PHILIP BRASOR
According to an Internet survey conducted by an Osaka polling service, 57 percent of Japanese
people ages 18 to 49 feel that the recent World Cup tournament helped improve relations between the
two co-hosting countries, Japan and the Republic of Korea. The media, both here and abroad, and
FIFA, are making a lot of noise about what a success the tournament was, and how both countries
were gracious, well-organized hosts.
But if the event added anything to the Japan-Korea relationship, it simply clarified each country's own
complicated view of that relationship. Co-hosting was never an idea that either country embraced
unreservedly. The idea, which has been traced back to Yohei Kono when he was the foreign minister
in 1994, was more or less a means of ensuring that neither country would lose face in the competition
to be Asia's first World Cup host.
Korea deserved the job more than Japan did. Soccer is, after all, Korea's national sport. More
important, when the country was a colony of Japan, the Koreans were forbidden to play it, since Japan
couldn't stand the idea that their subjects were better at something than they were. And though they'd
never won a game in the World Cup, Korea had played in three, Japan only in one.
In any case, all Japan really wanted was an excuse to build all those white-elephant stadiums, so the
co-hosting gig at least gave them that. Despite the rah-rah posturing of the sports newspapers and TV
commentators, Japanese fans were never as rabidly nationalistic about their team as most soccer
country's populations are, including Korea's.
Japanese supporters were niwaka (for-the-moment) fans, happy to cheer their boys in blue while they
were winning, but just as happy to redirect their loyalties somewhere else when they stopped. Thus,
the insane popularity of David Beckham and the confusion of foreign media people when confronted
with Japanese fans wearing the colors of Cameroon or Senegal or Spain or Germany or England or
Brazil.
Or even Korea, but support for the successful national team across the Japan Sea entailed a mixed
bag of emotions: part obligatory guilt trip, part real neighborly enthusiasm. The problem was that
whatever signals Japan was trying to send Korea's way, they were receiving quite different ones.
In a round-table discussion in last week's Asahi Shimbun, a group of reporters discussed the
"historical significance" of the co-hosting exercise and found it perplexing. A Seoul correspondent
admitted that he rarely met any Koreans who "cheered Japan" the way Japan cheered the Korean
team; and, in fact, he witnessed Koreans celebrating openly when Japan was defeated by Turkey.
While admitting somewhat cryptically that "a feeling of rivalry is actually healthy," the reporter also said
that Japan "must accept [the Korean] attitude as our fate."
A lot of the Japanese media hinted that Japan was perhaps being overly solicitous toward Korea since
Korea wasn't responding in kind. Korean fans are, in a real sense, more attuned to the nationalist
sentiments that are central to the World Cup experience, while Japanese fans are more or less
uncomfortable with it. If you watched Japanese TV, it seemed obvious that in Korea all the citizens
were supporters, while in Japan all citizens were simply interested in having a good time. If Korea
deserved to win, it was not only because of their team's sokojikara (latent power), but because their
supporters were genuine soccer fans.
Some of the Japanese media were naturally suspicious. The weekly magazine Shukan Shincho ran an
article filled with quotes from unnamed sources disparaging Korea for their over-zealousness: a
"thirtyish" salaryman, the wife of an anonymous sportswriter, a friend's 20-year-old daughter, that sort
of thing. "But nobody in the media talks about this," the writer says, as if such unsubstantiated
underbelly reporting really had any meaning.
TV tarento Ai Iijima reportedly became a hero in Internet chat rooms after she complained that the
officiating of the Korea-Italy match was obviously biased toward Korea. "It's unfair," she said on the
TBS variety show "Sunday Japon," "I'll never eat kimchi again." The media picked it up as a refreshing
bit of candor and a clue into the average Japanese person's unexpressed "frustration," but TBS told
the magazine Josei Jishin that they didn't receive any complaints from Korea and, in any case, Iijima is
famous for such careless comments.
Comedian Sanma Akashiya appeared as a guest commentator on Nihon TV for Korea's ill-fated semifinal match wearing a German team uniform. The media hinted that Sanma was sending a message to
Korea, despite the fact that Sanma was wearing a West German uniform (in other words, a souvenir
he picked up a long time ago). It's fairly well-known that Sanma has been a Germany fan for many
years. When he made a joke about Korean player Ahn Jung Hwan's new hairstyle, saying it looked
like "something you'd see on a middle-aged woman," the media prepared itself for the inevitable
Korean backlash. It never came. In fact, a Korean reporter told Josei Jishin, "We don't get angry at
such little things."
In other words, they get angry at the big things, like the prime minister's visits to Yasukuni Shrine and
history textbooks that paper over Japan's imperialist past. Koreans still feel they have a right to
express whatever bitterness they feel about Japan, while the Japanese are still very careful about
betraying even the slightest negative feeling they may have about Korea. In that regard, nothing has
changed.
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July 20, 2006
Japan's anti-North Korea complex
By GREGORY CLARK
Japan's fevered reaction to North Korea's recent missile tests should not surprise. It is yet another
example of the emotional way that an otherwise admirable nation finds it hard to separate causes from
effects.
In 1994, North Korea was just hours away from having its nuclear facilities bombed by the United
States. The attack was averted at the last moment by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, visiting
Pyongyang and hammering out an agreed framework to solve the nuclear dispute.
But almost from the start, the dominant conservatives in the U.S. Congress made it clear they
opposed the agreement, especially its promise eventually to normalize relations with the U.S.
Believing North Korea was on the point of economic and social collapse, they wanted a policy of
confrontation and regime change. That policy was formally endorsed in January 2002 when U.S.
President George W. Bush included North Korea in his "axis of evil."
Whether the North Korean regime of those days deserved to be forcibly changed can be argued. But if
a regime under threat tries to at least pretend that it can defend itself from attack, can anyone be
surprised?
U.S. promises not to "invade" North Korea are meaningless when the real danger for Pyongyang
remains, as in 1994, the threat of air attack. U.S. calls for North Korea to join in six-party talks to
resolve the nuclear dispute are also fairly meaningless while Washington continues to refuse the
bilateral talks needed -- and promised -- for the all-important normalization of relations. Without that
normalization, Pyongyang has to assume it is still on the enemy list and could be attacked at any time.
Without at least some pretense at nuclear and rocket preparations, it appears vulnerable.
Little of this cause-and-effect reasoning has made any impression on Japan or its media. In talk show
after talk show, editorial after editorial, North Korea's recent demonstration of its retaliatory rocket
power has been denounced as ultimate evil. Even the once fairly neutral NHK, the national
broadcaster, has set out determinedly to denounce North Korea for dangerous brinkmanship.
Even progressives are -- using that favorite word of the conservatives and the hawks -- kitchiri, or
sternly decisive -- to describe the anti-Pyongyang policies they want Tokyo to take. Not just the
hawkish Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe, but many other more moderate voices have called for
U.S.-nuclear-protected Japan to develop its own first-strike ability against nonnuclear-protected North
Korea. Nowhere have I come across any hint in this otherwise intelligent nation that there may be valid
reasons for North Korea's missile testing.
True, our crusading Western moralists also have problems in unraveling causes and effects. They
have yet to realize that if the West kills Islamists, the Islamists will want to kill Westerners in return. But
over North Korea at least the disconnect is not quite as blatantly perverse as in Japan. A growing body
of U.S. opinion now realizes that opening bilateral talks with Pyongyang to normalize relations is the
key to resolving the so-called nuclear crisis.
Meanwhile in Japan, North Korea's missile tests are seen as an open invitation to unleash the military
hawks with their expensive armament plans and hardline policies. The tit-for-tat confrontation ratchet
moves up yet another notch.
Japan's continuing abductee dispute with Pyongyang compounds the damage. North Korea's bad
behavior of the '70s and '80s over abductions and its continued bad behavior today on other questions
may or may not have its reasons. North Korea was after all, and still is, technically in a state of war
with the U.S. and its U.N. allies. It has also suffered much bad behavior from its former enemy in
South Korea.
But on the abduction issue what is relevant is that it has apologized and, when treated politely, is
willing to make concessions like returning some abductees. Tokyo, with highly emotional media and
public-opinion support, is doing all it can to make sure that Pyongyang will not want to make any more
concessions. Hawks on both sides are delighted.
Much is being made of Pyongyang's unwillingness to provide full details of its former abduction
program. Some say up to 100 Japanese citizens may have been taken. But compare this with Tokyo's
continuing reluctance to admit the wartime abduction and abuse of 40,000 Chinese slave laborers, not
to mention conscripting hundreds of thousands of Koreans for hard labor in Japan more than 60 years
ago. Japan, better than any other country, should realize that no nation likes to have its dirty linen
aired.
Nor is it just a problem of Japan being unable to understand causes. It seems to have had as much
trouble realizing the possible effects of its anti-North Korea policies.
South Korea's significant calls for Japan to cool its abductee and missile-test indignations were hardly
noticed; yet clearly Seoul is in no mood to have its "Look North" policies jeopardized by Tokyo's antiNorth fixation. Tokyo pretended not even to hear Seoul's extraordinary warnings about the fixation
being used as an excuse for revived Japanese militarism.
Tokyo can ignore Beijing's warnings, claiming it does not have to listen to communists. But when your
former anticommunist friends accuse you of misbehavior you should listen, attentively.
Worse, few in Japan seem even to realize that one result of all this carry-on could be to drive Seoul
further into an anti-Japan alliance with Beijing.
A researcher with the Mitsui Bussan Strategic Research Institute, Kim Midoku, writing in Sekai Shuho,
has recently shown in detail the extent of South Korea's drift away from Japan and toward China on
economic and cultural issues. The disputes with Tokyo over visits to Yasukuni Shrine and ownership
of the Takeshima islets add a political dimension. A clash over North Korea policy could well be the
last straw pushing South Korea into China's embrace. The damage to Japan's interests would be
enormous.
Reports that even Washington wants Tokyo to back off somewhat over Yasukuni and other issues
irritating Seoul are symptomatic. The U.S. at least realizes that its alliance with a Japan increasingly
isolated in Asia would do little to further its own interests. Tokyo has yet to get even that far in its
reasoning.
Gregory Clark is a former Australian diplomat and vice president of Akita International University. A
Japanese translation of this article will appear at: www.gregoryclark.net
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June 19, 2009
North to target Japan if war starts
Tokyo more at risk than Seoul if sanctions row worsens: expert
WASHINGTON (Kyodo) North Korea would attack Japan if a war erupted as a result of efforts to
implement recently strengthened U.N. sanctions against Pyongyang over its second nuclear test, a
U.S. scholar said Wednesday.
Selig Harrison, Asia program director at the Washington-based Center for International Policy,
sounded the warning during a House Foreign Affairs Committee subcommittee hearing on North
Korea policy.
"In the event of another war with North Korea resulting from efforts to enforce the U.N. sanctions, it is
Japan that North Korea would attack, in my view, not South Korea," said Harrison, who visited North
Korea in January.
"The reason — U.S. bases in Japan, in all likelihood," he said, attributing the North's eagerness to
attack Japan to the U.S. military presence in the country.
"Nationalistic younger generals with no experience of the outside world are now in a strong position in
the North Korean leadership" in the wake of the reported illness suffered by leader Kim Jong Il last
year that led to "his reduced role in day-to-day management," he said.
Earlier this month, the U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution to punish Pyongyang
over its nuclear test in late May, centering on tougher financial sanctions and the stricter enforcement
of North Korean cargo inspections.
North Korea reacted with anger to the resolution, saying it would "weaponize" more plutonium, begin
uranium enrichment and react militarily to blockades.
Harrison said the U.N. sanctions have further strengthened the generals' hardline position because all
North Koreans feel threatened by U.S. nuclear arms deployed near their border, and would be united if
tensions caused by attempts to implement the sanctions should escalate to war.
The generals, he said, "have alarmed" others in the North Korean regime with their "unrealistic
assessments of Pyongyang's capabilities" in the case of a conflict with Japan.
The scholar also said some of the generals were angry at the North Korean leader's apology for
Pyongyang's past abductions of Japanese nationals during his September 2002 talks with then Prime
Minister Junichiro Koizumi.
Despite the apology, Japan and North Korea remain at odds over the abductions and the row has
been an obstacle to normalizing ties.
"When Kim Jong Il apologized to Prime Minister Koizumi in 2002, this was a very sensitive matter
inside North Korea. This was regarded as very unfortunate by many of the nationalistic younger
generals and other generals and others within North Korea," Harrison said.
"But this is history. Japanese colonialism was the biggest event in the history of Korea that had an
impact on the current situation, in many ways," he added.
North bans passage
North Korea has banned vessels from passing through waters off its eastern coast, the Japan Coast
Guard said Thursday, raising the possibility Pyongyang is planning to test more short-range missiles
over the Sea of Japan.
The coast guard issued a warning to ships planning to pass through the area after monitoring a North
Korean radio broadcast announcing the navigation ban.
According to the coast guard, the ban covers an area some 263 km long and up to 54 km wide off
Wonsan in eastern North Korea.
The area is almost the same as that specified in a ban issued earlier this month. The fresh navigation
ban runs from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Japan time every day through June 30, the same as the earlier ban.
The coast guard said it is not known why North Korea issued the fresh navigation ban or if it is linked
with the previous one.
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Dec. 1, 2002
South Korea helps Japan to get more trendy
By PHILIP BRASOR
As we draw to the end of the so-called Year of Korea and Japan, which was sort of forced on the two
neighbors by FIFA, we should take a moment to reflect on just how much closer the countries across
the Sea of Japan have grown in the past 10 months.
"Bad girl" Kim So Yan (left) casts a disparaging glance toward "good girl" Che Lim in the South Korean
drama "All About Eve."
For the most part, the Japanese have been cordial, though the strain of being cordial has sometimes
shown. Koreans, not noted for subtlety or restraint, have been less cordial, but hardly rude. We know
these things because the Japanese media has spent more time covering Korea (South and North) this
year than ever before, and they've inevitably tried to compare the Korean mind-set to that of the
Japanese.
It's a difficult endeavor, and probably the best way to do it is not by comparing people, but by
comparing the means of expression that happen to be similar. Several Japanese broadcasting
companies have imported South Korean television dramas this year.
In terms of themes and general technique, they are almost identical to Japanese "trendy dramas."
Japanese people who watch them may flatter themselves by thinking that the Koreans copied the
Japanese style, but that's unlikely since until only a few years ago, Japanese popular culture was
banned in South Korea.
A more likely reason for the resemblance is a similarity in dramatic re-creation. Both Korean and
Japanese actors tend toward an exaggerated style of declamation. Directors from both countries favor
close-ups and reaction shots.
The stories themselves offer clearer contrasts. "All About Eve" (TV Asahi; Friday, 11:15 p.m.) seems
not unlike a lot of classic Japanese trendy dramas: Two beautiful young women are hired as
announcers by a major TV station and compete with each other in terms of career and romance. But
that's where the similarity ends.
On the surface, the difference seems to be one of scale. The hierarchical social structure that is the
basis for most of the conflict in "Eve" can be found in Japan in a less pronounced form, but it's the
effect that this structure has on both the characters and the viewers that's different.
The "good" announcer, Chin Son Mi (Che Lim) grew up in a loving, well-connected family, while the
"bad" announcer, Ho Yon Mi (Kim So Yon), had to struggle to survive. Son Mi gets ahead through
brains and pluck, while Yon Mi gets ahead through cunning and deceit. According to an article in the
magazine Telepal, Yon Mi was a much more popular character among Korean viewers when the
series was first broadcast on the peninsula in 2000.
In South Korea, the differences between poor and rich are clear and open, and breeding is only a
matter of blood. Self-improvement has nothing to do with it.
Yon Mi is helpless to avoid her fate, so she embraces it by bullying Son Mi at every turn, messing up
her romance with the son of the president of the TV station, and using her considerable sexual wiles to
break the heart of Son Mi's saintly cousin. In Japan, Yon Mi would be portrayed as a she-devil. In
Korea she is seen as a tragic but heroic figure.
The male cognate is "Mr. Duke" (MXTV; Monday, 10 p.m.). In this drama, also from 2000, the
daughter of a proud company president balks at the husband her father has chosen for her. Having
studied in England and wishing to return there, she invents a boyfriend, a Korean scholar pursuing his
doctorate at an English university. Naturally, dad wants to meet this fine fellow, and the girl's maid
hires a local deliveryman to impersonate the fictional scholar just for a few days. The guy is rough and
low-bred, but he does a passable job. Unfortunately, he also falls in love with the girl (and she with
him), and the jilted paramour, who has designs on the president's company and not just his daughter,
finds out about the subterfuge.
In Japan, such a story would make for an average romantic comedy, but "Mr. Duke" is a fairly serious
drama. The impostor is messing with the social structure, and the consequences of his masquerade
seem to be dire.
Since the conflict in all trendy dramas is romantic, it's helpful to compare attitudes toward gender and
sexuality. The Telepal article includes a box that lists the prominent characteristics of Korean men and
women.
In a nutshell, desirable men, regardless of their social status, are buff and macho; while women,
regardless of social status and viewer sympathies, use their sexuality aggressively. It's perfectly
justifiable for a woman to sleep with a man to get what she wants.
In Japanese dramas, male romantic leads are typically soft and feminine so as not to threaten female
viewers, who tend to equate "macho" with hairy samurai for whom rape is something you do after
lunch. Japanese female leads, while not always virginal, are nevertheless sexually tame.
These differences have less to do with mores than with matters of distinction. Koreans seem to prefer
their characters sharply drawn, while the Japanese like a bit of blur around the edges, even some
flaws. The most noticeable attribute of Korean actresses is the inordinate amount of makeup they
wear. There is a single standard for beauty, which sometimes makes it difficult to distinguish one
female character from another. They all have absolutely perfect teeth, whereas a slightly crooked
bicuspid is a "charm point" for a Japanese idol.
All Korean actresses wear the same mauve lip gloss, and the short, efficient hairstyle sported by Son
Mi has since become the rage. More significantly, Korean women are very open about cosmetic
surgery. Many actresses, even those as young as 20, have been under the knife and aren't
embarrassed to say so. As far as I know, male actors aren't as forthcoming about hairpieces, but there
is such a thing as being too frank.
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Jan. 16, 2009
Yakuza returns after five years in North Korea jail on drug charge
A Japanese gang member returned home Wednesday from North Korea, where he had been held for
more than five years on drug smuggling charges, officials said.
Yoshiaki Sawada arrived at Narita International Airport via Beijing, according to airport police official
Hiroyasu Kiuchi.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Kazuo Kodama confirmed he was released Tuesday, as initially reported
by North Korea's state media.
The North's official Korea Central News Agency said Sawada was taken into custody in October 2003
after allegedly trying to bribe a North Korean into buying drugs from a third country and smuggling
them into Japan, adding he was released as a "humanitarian measure" by the regime.
Sawada told reporters at the airport that he was a member of a major yakuza crime syndicate and had
gone to North Korea to "check out a drug deal."
KCNA said Sawada had confessed "to his crime." It also said Sawada was part of a plot to back
accusations that North Korea used its Mangyongbong-92 ferry to smuggle drugs to Japan.
Sawada said he collaborated with a Japanese national living in Pyongyang in the plan to smuggle
illegal drugs out of North Korea. He did not identify his supposed accomplice.
Kiuchi said airport police officials had no plans to arrest or question Sawada immediately. Kodama
added that Japanese authorities did not know what Sawada's alleged crime was and were not aware
that he had violated Japanese law.
Kodama declined comment on why North Korea freed Sawada or if Tokyo had negotiated his release.
Japan and North Korea have no diplomatic ties and are in dispute over the North's abduction of
Japanese nationals decades ago.
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Aug. 2, 2005
The end of silence: Korea's Hiroshima
Korean A-bomb victims seek redress
By ANDREAS HIPPIN
When Shin Jin Tae's first daughter died, her mother was still breast-feeding her.
"She became thinner and thinner until she passed away," the 62-year-old farmer says. When more
mysterious diseases and inexplicable deaths occurred in Hapcheon county where he lives, Shin
started to think that all this might be related to the past.
Shin was born in Hiroshima. When the atomic bomb was dropped on Aug. 6, 1945, he was two years
old.
"More than 70 percent of the Korean victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki came from Hapcheon," he
says. Most of the survivors returned. Shin is one of 598 atomic bomb victims still living there.
Hapcheon county is an otherwordly place in South Korea's Gyeongsangnamdo Province. With its rice
paddies and mixed deciduous and coniferous forests, the poor mountainous region north of Pusan is a
paradise for romantics.
Haeinsa, a UNESCO world heritage temple boasting a collection of more than 80.000 beautifully
carved woodblocks with Buddhist scriptures, is hidden in its mountains.
But these mountains also keep darker secrets from a more recent past.
Hapcheon is also called "the Korean Hiroshima."
"Ten percent of the 700,000 victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were Korean. Most of them were
forced laborers making guns and ammunition in the factories of the Japanese military. Others were
landless farmers, mostly from Hapcheon, looking for employment in Japanese cities," says Kang Je
Suk.
As secretary general of a group called Peace Project Network, her main aim is to achieve
compensation for former forced laborers.
"That the victims of Hiroshima were not only Japanese is widely unknown in Japan and Korea. Japan
sees itself as the only nation that was ever attacked with an atomic weapon. But Koreans and other
Asians have also been hit," Kang says.
Many Koreans returned to Korea between 1945 and 1950.
"Those people were ignored by the Japanese and by the Korean government. Korean people were not
welcoming them," says Professor Han Hong Koo, a teacher of modern Korean history at
Sungkonghoe University in Seoul.
"Some were accused of being pro-Japanese. At least they have been there."
Young people like Shin faced discrimination because their Korean was not so good. Of the 50,000
Korean survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki 43,000 went back to the Korean peninsula.
"There were rumors that the Japanese would kill those who want to stay in Japan," says Kim Il Jo. She
was born in Kyoto, but had to move to Hiroshima. After being conscripted to work for the military she
had married quickly to avoid being transferred to another city. When the bomb fell she was 18 years
old.
"It was very hard for us to make a living in Hapcheon," she remembers. "We did not have our own land
and we had no idea of agriculture. But my husband's mother wanted to go back to Hapcheon."
Kim tried to re-enter Japan illegally with her husband in June 1946 but was caught and deported.
A-bomb victims who could not hide their scars were mistaken for victims of Hansen's disease and
excluded from society. Most of them ended up begging in the streets.
"Their scars were gleaming in the sun. They were easy to recognize," Shin remembers. Those who
were not recognized, tried to stay undercover. "If you went public, you could not get married anymore,"
Shin said. "I had to remain silent."
"There was no support from the government, so why should people admit they were atomic bomb
victims? There was no reason to tell it loudly," Professor Han explains.
According to him there were many reasons for the victims to remain silent. "Japan capitulated after the
bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Many people believe that the nuclear bombs liberated Korea,"
he says.
During the Korean War, the United States was thinking about the use of atomic bombs against the
North. And between 1957 and 1991 South Korea was under the U.S. nuclear umbrella. Between 600
and 1,200 U.S. nuclear weapons were deployed in the country.
"In this situation the victims could not speak out," Han says.
"Ninety percent of those who returned to South Korea died because there was no medical treatment
and no support for them," claims Kwak Kwi Hoon, president of the Korean Atomic Bomb Victim
Association.
A-bomb victims and their descendants are still unable to lead a normal life in South Korea.
"People do not hire private detectives to investigate the background of wedding candidates as in
Japan, but they are very afraid of genetic diseases," Professor Han says.
For this reason Kim Il Jo waited until 1993 before she registered as a victim. At that time her son and
her three daughters were married. She is one of the 79 residents of the Hapcheon Welfare Center for
Atomic Bomb Victims. Young offenders sentenced to some hours of community work here respectfully
call her "halmeoni" (grandmother).
The Welfare Center was built with Japanese money. In 1993, Japan paid South Korea 4 billion yen in
humanitarian assistance to help the Korean A-bomb survivors.
The money was handed over to the Red Cross and used to build and run the center and to pay the
survivors a small pension of 100,000 Won a month. Since the money from Japan ran out last year, the
Korean government has funded the Welfare Center. A lot of the equipment was donated by Japanese
NGOs like Kakkin.
That Japan never compensated Korean A-bomb victims has caused a lot of bitterness.
"We want compensation, not humanitarian gestures," says 72-year-old Kim Jae Man. "The Japanese
government is simply waiting for us to die. When I saw Koizumi on TV during his visit in Seoul I
thought: 'How can he treat me like this?' "
Kim was born in Hiroshima. When the bomb exploded he was in elementary school.
The Korean victims fought for decades to receive compensation and medical treatment from Japan.
In a landmark decision the Japanese Supreme Court decided in 1978 that Son Jin Doo, a South
Korean A-bomb victim who had entered Japan to get medical treatment in Saga, has to be treated
equally regardless of his status as an illegal immigrant.
However the health administration drafted a rule that turned Son's success into a Phyrric victory. It
limited medical treatment and pension payments to victims living in Japan. In October 1998, Kwak Kwi
Hoon sued against this rule. He wanted the Japanese government to pay for his follow-up treatment in
South Korea.
"We want to be treated like the Japanese victims. I am an A-bomb victim regardless whether I am in
Korea or Japan. I have to be compensated, wherever I am,", he argues. Four years later he won in
Supreme Court.
"The Japanese government has been taken to court more than 80 times by former forced laborers,
women forced into prostitution by the Japanese military and other victims from Korea. All were turned
down," Kwak says.
"Only I won and only I got money from Japan in the end. In my case the statute of limitations had not
expired and it was not about people just following their orders. The court just decided whether an
administrative rule was legally binding or not."
As a result A-bomb victims living abroad were able to get the official victim passbook ("hibakusha
techo") after March 1, 2003.
Approximately 3,000 survivors in Korea received it.
According to Kwak it is still difficult for the victims to apply for it, because they have to bring two
witnesses testifying that they were in Hiroshima or Nagasaki at the time of the bombings.
Because of her good Japanese language skills Kim Il Jo has often accompanied other victims as an
interpreter when they had to go to Japan.
"Under my Japanese name Matsumoto Kimiyo I worked three years as a bus service attendant for
Dentetsu in Hiroshima," she remembers. "They took me for a Japanese."
About 600 victims in South Korea still did not manage to get the passbook entitling them to medical
treatment and pension payments, Kwak says.
Even after their death, discrimination continues. While Japanese victims receive 198,000 yen for their
funeral, the Korean victims get nothing.
But it was not Mr. Kwak who put the issue on the political agenda this spring. Sixty years after, the
descendants of the victims managed to draw the attention of the South Korean public by proposing a
law to support the victims of the atomic bombings.
"Before that only progressive people from the medical sector did something about it," Professor Han
said.
Kim Hyeon Gyul was the leader of a group of 50 second generation victims who no longer wanted to
remain silent.
"Frankly speaking, as a historian I did not know that so many Koreans got killed until a year ago,"
admits Professor Han. "I heard about it from Kim Hyeon Gyul. Our schools do not tell much about the
dangers and horrors of nuclear weapons. In Hiroshima and Nagasaki about 50,000 Koreans were
killed in a day and there is nothing about it in the school books."
"We do not know how many second generation victims there are," he says. "At that time people had
four or five children each. That would make about 80,000 to 120,000 second generation victims in
South Korea."
The second generation issue is a ticking bomb, not only in South Korea. Kwak estimates that there are
500,000 second generation victims in Japan. The law proposed in South Korea addresses this issue
for the first time.
The public discussion encouraged NGOs like the Korea Youth Corps (KYC) to get engaged.
"In contrast to former forced laborers or the so called comfort women these people were excluded
from our history and abandoned," says Kim Dong Lyul. He is the KYC office head in Taegu. "We might
not be able to help them get compensated, but we can keep their history."
http://search.japantimes.co.jp
Dec. 19, 2009
South Korea hibakusha settle suit
OSAKA (Kyodo) Atomic bomb survivors living in South Korea settled a lawsuit Friday with Japan
under which they will each receive ¥1.1 million for the mental anguish they claim to have suffered over
being denied health care benefits because they live overseas.
The so-called amicable settlement, the first among similar suits, was reached between 130 plaintiffs
and the state at the Osaka District Court. It follows a 2007 Supreme Court ruling that the state
notification to terminate the benefit eligibility of survivors who left Japan was illegal.
According to the plaintiffs' lawyers, similar suits have been filed by hibakusha in South Korea, the
United States and Brazil with the Osaka, Hiroshima and Nagasaki District courts, and the lawyers
expect them to be settled at early dates.
A Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry official said the state is ready to settle the pending suits
amicably.
http://search.japantimes.co.jp
June 6, 2003
South Korea official hopes Emperor will visit soon
SEOUL (Kyodo) South Korea's foreign and trade minister has voiced hope that Emperor Akihito may
visit South Korea in the near future.
Yoon Young Kwan issued the entreaty during an interview earlier this week, with a state visit to Japan
by South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun starting Friday.
"I hope both countries make efforts to create a favorable atmosphere that could lead to the Emperor's
visit to (South) Korea," Yoon said.
An Imperial visit has been a touchy issue in Japan and in South Korea, where strong anti-Japanese
sentiment lingers over Japan's colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula between 1910 and 1945.
"The Emperor's visit to (South) Korea, symbolic of having built a 'future-oriented' bilateral relationship
in the 21st century, will provide momentum to show the two countries have entered an era in which
(South) Korean and Japanese people genuinely understand and respect each other," Yoon said.
Roh took office Feb. 25, having won the December presidential election to serve a single five-year
term.
He will hold talks with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi during his four-day visit and have an audience
with the Emperor.
In the same interview, Yoon revealed that South Korea may further open its markets to Japanese
cultural products in an effort to cement friendly relations.
Roh will publicize South Korea's position on this issue during his visit, Yoon said.
The matter is under consideration in light of the friendly relationship forged by the successful cohosting
of the 2002 World Cup soccer finals, Yoon said.
Roh's predecessor, Kim Dae Jung, lifted a series of long-standing bans on Japanese cultural imports,
although the South Korean market remains partly off-limits due to lingering public resentment of
Japan's colonial rule.
Turning to Koizumi's appearances at Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine, which honors Japan's war dead as well
as Class-A war criminals, Yoon said South Korea cannot overlook these visits and they should stop.
"We can never condone tributes to the war criminals who inflicted suffering on neighboring countries
by colonization and aggression, and we adhere to the position (that) such tributes should not be paid
again," Yoon said.
Koizumi's visits to the Shinto shrine sparked outrage in South Korea and China, which suffered under
Japanese occupation.
http://search.japantimes.co.jp
May 20, 2001
HEAVEN ON A STICK
Big taste treats await in Osaka's Little Korea
By KENZO MORIGUCHI
OSAKA -- As soon as you exit the station wickets, sometimes even before that, the aroma hits you.
Welcome to Tsuruhashi, it says, the town of yakiniku.
Located on the border of Tennoji and Ikuno wards in eastern Osaka, Tsuruhashi, for locals, has
become almost synonymous with Korean barbecue because of the abundance of restaurants and
shops here specializing in it and other Korean cuisine.
Here you don't have to worry about making the wrong choice on where to eat. Almost all of the
establishments clustered west of the JR Kanjo Line tracks and north of the Kintetsu Line tracks are
worth a try.
For a good first taste, try Tsuruichi -- the most famous and one of the oldest yakiniku restaurants in
town. One of the reasons this place is so popular -- in addition to its matching of reasonable prices
with generous portions of good-quality meat -- is because of its charcoal grills.
While all branches of the Tsuruichi chain use charcoal rather than gas for their table-top grills, the
main restaurant is special in that it is equipped with shichirin, rather than modern smoke-free grills. So,
though it's rather smoky, it's a more genuine barbecue experience.
As for the taste of the meat, that's pretty much guaranteed, as is the queue outside Tsuruichi's doors.
Still, unless there are more than 10 groups in line, you should get to table without too long a wait. It'll
be worth it.
Here are some other eateries to check out in the Tsuruhashi area:Yoshida -- A slightly more upscale
yakiniku restaurant, Yoshida is neat and so is the food. And you don't have to worry about smoke.
Sora -- This is the place for people who eat everything. A yakiniku establishment with most seating at
the counter, Sora offers 30 different unusual cuts of meat from the intestines on down -- and up.
Hakuundai -- Hakuundai is for those who want to experience a genuine Korean royal course dinner
without forking out the airfare to South Korea.
Taikyuya -- This rather posh restaurant also offers more traditional Korean fare. A 4,000 yen set dinner
includes some 15 different small dishes.
Pusanya -- Located on an alley off the main drag, Pusanya is rather cozy. It serves up homemade
Korean soup and pot dishes, which, when eaten with a bowl of rice, will fill you up for under 2,000 yen.
Ajiyoshi -- Both the main restaurant and annex of Ajiyoshi are equal in popularity to Tsuruichi. But
though yakiniku is served, the real specialty here is reimen noodles, which are homemade and very
chewy, as is characteristic of Korean noodles. Some regulars come to Ajiyoshi for noodles after eating
barbecue elsewhere.
Feel like trying your hand at cooking up some Korean cuisine at home? Visit the Korean market on the
other side of the JR Kanjo tracks. Here, there are more than 30 shops selling a variety of Korean
products, mainly foodstuffs, ranging from kimchi to Korean instant noodles.
All the kimchi is homemade, using Korean chili powder and even some fresh vegetables imported from
the Korean Peninsula.
The shops' main customers are the local restaurants, as well as Korean and other residents of Osaka.
For tourists, there are a number of ethnic items available. Just don't go on a Wednesday; all the shops
are closed.
Snacks are readily available in the area. Chijimi (Korean pancakes) are sold at stalls in and around the
Korean market. The Rock Villa cafe, meanwhile, serves up a good cup of coffee and its original kimchi
sandwich. Priced at 500 yen, this is a toasted sandwich with ordinary fillings such as cucumbers, eggs
and ham topped with kimchi pickles. Delicious!
Back on the other side of the JR tracks, north of the Kintetsu Line, is the Tsuruhashi Shopping Arcade.
Here, you can buy traditional Korean clothes and ethnic works of art, making it a good area for
browsing. Just be careful not to get lost among the 180 shops lining the narrow alleys. But if you do,
you know what to do. Just follow the smell of barbecue back toward the station.
http://search.japantimes.co.jp
Dec. 16, 2008
Young 'Zainichi' Koreans look beyond Chongryon ideology
Former students of pro-Pyongyang schools offer diverse views on regime in North, identity
By BLAIR McBRIDE
Imagine attending school with portraits of the late North Korean dictator, Kim Il Sung, and current
leader Kim Jong Il hanging on the classroom walls. This is a reality at schools operated by the General
Association of Korean Residents in Japan.
Seoul man: Jungwang Kwang speaks in Ginza, Tokyo, about his experiences as a Chongryon student
in Nagoya. "The school made me proud to be Korean," says Kwang, "but it's easier to be Japanese,
and actually I'd rather be South Korean." STEFAN SPAETH PHOTOS
Known as Chongryon in Korean and "Chosen Soren" in Japanese, the association runs 60 Koreanlanguage schools throughout Japan, ranging from kindergartens through high school, and even a
university — Korea University — in Tokyo. Chongryon members represent roughly 25 percent of the
610,000 people known as "Zainichi" Koreans — those born and raised in Japan who have not taken
Japanese citizenship. Sixty-five percent of Zainichi Koreans are members of the pro-South Korea
Mindan organization.
Although Mindan has a larger membership, their school system is not as extensive or developed as
Chongryon's. Chongryon supports North Korea politically, and until recently the curriculum offered
political ideology and history classes from a North Korean perspective, implying uncritical praise for
the North's leaders and the communist system.
How do graduates of the Chosen Soren system see themselves? Members of the Korean community
have strong and differing opinions on identity. Some asked that their full names not be used in this
article.
"North Korea is my country," says Mr. Shin, 25, a Korea University graduate and resident of Aichi
Prefecture who has spent his whole life in Japan. "I'm North Korean. I think how you understand
yourself entirely changes your life."
Jungwang Kwang, 33, originally from Nagoya but now working at an English school in Chiba, says he
identifies more with South Korea despite having been through the Chongryon education system. "The
school made me proud to be Korean, but it's easier to be Japanese, and actually I'd rather be South
Korean. I used to think I was unique, but it's complicated to talk about because the image of Koreans
is sometimes negative (here)."
Like most Chongryon high school students, Kasun Kang visited North Korea on a school trip. "The
funny thing is that we wouldn't want to live there, but it was good to be in our homeland," says Kang,
who works in Tokyo as a translator. "When I visited South Korea it didn't feel like home. I'm not North
Korean but I'm a North Korean in Japan — a Zainichi."
Ms. Chin, a schoolmate of Kang also living in Tokyo, agrees. "North Korea is my country, but I'm lucky
that I was born in Japan. Which team would I cheer for if I watched a soccer game between North
Korea and Japan? It's hard to answer that."
Despite their differing views on identity, Kang, Chin, and Kwang do have one thing in common: They
all recently acquired South Korean passports. Despite Chongryon's ties to the North, Chin reckons
that about half the community has South Korean passports. "I don't know of anyone who has gotten a
North Korean passport," she says.
"A South Korean passport is more convenient," explains Kang. "When I traveled it was annoying
dealing with the Japanese re-entry certificate in my passport that said I was North Korean." What
about getting a North Korean passport? "I never considered it."
Kang feels an allegiance to North Korea, but growing up in a society hostile to the North and traveling
abroad has left her with a complex view of the land she visited 14 years ago.
"I used to be more communistic but I've traveled abroad and heard other opinions, so I'm not
communist anymore," she says. "We don't need to study socialist ideology, but on the other hand if
North Korea becomes capitalist, then what does North Korea mean? I'm not sure. It's ridiculous
studying the ideology of Kim Jong Il, but at the same time Japan teaches its own ideology in school."
As a student, Chin says that she had a "good impression" of North Korea, but now she questions
communism "because in North Korea only the elite are rich and the rest are poor. The late-1990s
famine there showed me that communism is failing, but I still don't think that capitalism is the best
system." Like most other people, Chin was "shocked by the abductions of Japanese citizens and that
North Korea admitted to it. They said they did it to teach spies Japanese language and culture, but I
wondered why when there are Japanese-speaking Koreans in Japan. It shook my faith in North
Korea."
The future for Chongryon's schools looks uncertain. Enrollment has dropped from a high of 46,000
pupils in the early 1970s to about 15,000 in recent years. Financial problems are also accelerating the
decline. North Korea is said to have stopped subsidizing the schools and the Japanese government
has refused funding requests.
"Many schools are in the red and tuition is double compared to Japanese schools," says Kwang. "My
mother teaches at a Chongryon junior high school and the student numbers are less than half of what
they used to be."
Ms. Ryu, a 31-year old administrative assistant in Kobe and a schoolmate of Kang, explains that after
news of the abductions broke a lot changed at Chongryon schools. "When I was a student, all the
classrooms had portraits of the two Kim leaders on the walls, but they were taken down. Now, their
portraits are only in the teachers' room. And the studies of Kim Jong Il's childhood were removed from
the curriculum." Curriculum issues cause difficulties because the "socialist paradise" ideology bumps
up against the "failed state" image most people have of North Korea.
Chin believes "North Korea should admit its faults and give the truth to the students. People won't lose
faith in North Korea if the truth is shown."
Kwang is more blunt. "Anybody can tell that North Korea is a bad place. Those who support Kim Jong
Il look like the odd men out now."
Ryu objects to the political ideology on more pragmatic grounds. "I'm grateful that I learned my
language and made lots of friends, but I wasn't into studying the life or ideas of Kim Il Sung. Koreans
should learn more about how to live in Japanese society." Ryu also considers some of Chongryon's
actions unwise considering the negative image of North Korea in Japan. "The Japanese media's
negative portrayal of North Korea doesn't tell the whole story, but my friends are worried sending their
children to school. For example, school buses driving down the street with 'North Korean school bus'
written in kanji will give a bad impression to Japanese. That makes many parents nervous about what
others think."
Compounding Chongryon's problems is the fact that more Koreans are assimilating. "We're getting
used to Japanese society," explains Chin. "Once many students grow up it's hard to maintain North
Korean patriotism and they'll send their kids to Japanese schools."
There are, however, limits to this trend toward assimilation and integration. Even Ryu, who is
unenthusiastic about Chongryon's emphasis on North Korea, is careful to point out that Zainichi
Koreans still face discrimination in Japan. "Talented Koreans haven't been allowed to rise. Older
generations were excluded from integrating into Japanese society, and Korean organizations
welcomed those people. But things are changing now even though prejudice is still there. As long as
there's discrimination in Japan there will be a need for the Chosen Soren schools."
Kang believes "both sides should change — the discriminatory Japanese attitude and the insular
Korean-community attitude. I want the (Chongryon) schools to last, but I wonder if they can. My
elementary school shut down. I would send my children to the schools only if they change the
curriculum ideology."
With the Korean Peninsula split between two countries with diametrically opposed political systems
that are still technically at war, there are currently few options out there for Zainichi parents who want
their children to receive a Korean education in Japan without political overtones.
"Language and culture are important to learn," says Ryu, "but realistically, it would be difficult to make
a pan-Korean school curriculum without political biases. Politically independent schools will come only
in the distant future, like when my grandchildren will be going to school."
http://search.japantimes.co.jp
June 29, 2002
Tsuruhashi, home of 'exotic' Korea in Osaka
By ERIC JOHNSTON
OSAKA — You can always tell when your train reaches Tsuruhashi Station. Unlike the other, mostly
nondescript, stops on the JR Osaka Loop Line, the district has an atmosphere, flavor and aroma that
makes it one of the city's most interesting neighborhoods.
Tsuruhashi is the historic and cultural home to one of the largest populations of Korean residents in
Japan.
As visitors exit the station, the smell of kimchi, "yakiniku" (grilled beef) and other Korean delicacies
hangs in the air. Walking through the Korean food stalls, one can hear Korean almost as often as
Japanese, while seeing the occasional sign in hangul.
Nearly 20,000 Koreans live in Tsuruhashi, and 50,000 live in Ikuno Ward, of which Tsuruhashi is a
part. Although exact figures are not available, district merchants and officials of the pro-Seoul Korean
Residents Union in Japan (Mindan) says Japanese visitors have increased in recent years.
At a time when many Korean residents of Japan, especially third- and fourth-generation Koreans, are
taking Japanese citizenship because of a desire to blend in, many young Japanese have, in
Tsuruhashi, been discovering the "exotic" Korea.
Osaka officials, recognizing the business potential of Tsuruhashi, have in recent years included the
area in tourist brochures, touting it as a symbol of local ties with the Korean Peninsula.
Such official promotions have received mixed reactions in the district, which became a Korean cultural
hub around the 1920s when Korea was under Japanese colonial rule. Japan was rapidly urbanizing
and in need of thousands of laborers to work at factories and businesses, so many Koreans were
brought to Japan, often forcibly.
"For decades, Osaka wanted nothing to do with Tsuruhashi. Its presence was an embarrassment to
officials and to Japanese who discriminated against Koreans. Now, suddenly, the city is claiming it as
part of Osaka culture. It's strange," said Kimiko Hamaguchi, a Japanese resident of Tsuruhashi who
runs a coffee shop. "Still, if the added attention helps Tsuruhashi economically, then perhaps it might
lead to social changes as well, and help Koreans in their fight for social justice and recognition."
http://search.japantimes.co.jp
April 1, 2007
Seoul urges Japan to look 'squarely' at sex slavery
JEJU, South Korea (Kyodo) South Korea on Saturday urged Japan to face up to its wartime sex
slavery of foreign women.
"We see mistaken actions in relation to the 'comfort women' issue taking place in Japan. There is a
need to face history squarely," Song Min Soon, South Korea's foreign affairs and trade minister, was
quoted as telling Foreign Minister Taro Aso during a bilateral meeting on Jeju Island, according to a
Japanese official.
Song was referring to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's recent remarks that there is no evidence the
Japanese military forced these women, euphemistically known in Japan as "comfort women," to work
in military brothels during World War II.
From the outset of their two-hour meeting, Song said different perceptions over history-related issues - an allusion to the comfort women issue -- are "making it difficult" to move the bilateral relationship
forward.
He and Aso were meeting for the second time since Song assumed his post late last year. They
discussed bilateral and multilateral issues ranging from history issues and the North Korean nuclear
standoff to the demarcation of disputed waters.
Aso responded that the Japanese government continues to uphold a 1993 statement issued by then
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono acknowledging that the Japanese army forced women into sexual
servitude for its soldiers, he told reporters after the meeting.
Song told Aso they should work together to resolve issues caused by the mistakes of past
generations.
The meeting, their first in South Korea and the second since Song assumed his post late last year,
comes at a time when bilateral ties are improving and after the latest round of six-party talks ended
without substantive discussions on North Korea's denuclearization. Song visited Tokyo in late
December.
On North Korea, Aso and Song reaffirmed the importance of following up on Pyongyang's
commitment, made in a Feb. 13 six-party accord, to implement initial steps for denuclearization within
60 days, in exchange for energy and economic aid from the other parties, the official said.
Aso and Song also affirmed that they will continue to negotiate the demarcation of the two countries'
exclusive economic zones around a pair of South Korean-administered islets in the Sea of Japan.
But they did not go beyond what was discussed in a round of negotiations in Tokyo in March when the
two nations failed to reach a breakthrough in demarcating their EEZs.
http://www.theglobalist.com
South Korea's Roh Moo-Hyun: What Japan Should Learn From Europe
By Roh Moo Hyun, April 07, 2005
Throughout Asia, there is quite a bit of upheaval about Japan's failure to own up to its legacy of World
War II -- as yet another controversy brews over a new Japanese history schoolbook. As South Korea's
President Roh Moo-Hyun argues in this Globalist Document, it is high time that Japan do what
Germany did to mend its troubled relations with France decades ago -- and apologize.
South Korea and Japan share the same destiny in working together to open the age of Northeast Asia.
Unless we pursue the path toward the consolidation of peace and common prosperity through mutual
cooperation, our two countries cannot guarantee the safety and happiness of our citizens.
Reconciliation and cooperation
Progress in legal and political terms alone will not guarantee the future of the two countries. With only
that, we cannot say that we did all we ought to.
More than that, it is necessary to exert efforts for substantial reconciliation and cooperation.
We should be born again as a genuine neighbor by bringing down, with truth and sincerity, the mental
wall blocking the two peoples.
France handed down stern judgment against its citizens involved in anti-state activities [collaborators;
The Editors], but joined with Germany in a magnanimous manner to create the European Union.
European parallels to Asian feud
Last year, French President Chirac extended the first invitation ever to the German Chancellor to the
ceremony celebrating the 60th anniversary of the Normandy landing and said that the French people
welcomed him as a friend.
Like the French, our people aspire to be a magnanimous neighbor with Japan. Thus far, our
Government has been restrained not to incite wrath and hatred among the people and has been
making a positive effort to promote reconciliation and cooperation. In fact, I think that our people have
been acting discreetly with restraint and reason.
Righting wrongs
However, the problem cannot be solved by our efforts alone.
To further develop relations between Japan and South Korea, sincere efforts are needed on the part
of the government and people of Japan.
They need to discover the truth about their past, reflect on it and make a genuine apology as well as
reparations if need be -- and then reconcile. This is the universal process for settling historic problems
in all other parts of the world.
I fully understand the indignation of Japan stemming from its citizens being kidnapped by North
Koreans. But at the same time, I would like to ask Japan to reflect on itself as well.
A bitter past
I hope that Japan understands the indignation of the Korean people who suffered pain countless times
because of Japan exploiting Korean draftees and "comfort women" during the 36 years of its imperial
rule.
Once again, I appeal to the conscience of Japan. I hope that Japan, based on its genuine selfreflection, will take the initiative in removing the deep-seated emotional hurdle between the two
neighbors -- and heal the scar.
The need for a genuine apology
The Japan that prides itself as an advanced nation can further project itself as a conscientious nation
as well. Otherwise, it will not be able to get out of the yoke of the past.
In the same light, however strong it may become in the economy and military preparedness, it will be
difficult for Japan to earn the trust of its neighbors and become a leading nation in the international
community.
Germany did all it could do. As a result, it is treated very well. The Germans delved into the past on
their own, made an apology and reparations -- and through their decisive moral action, they were able
to emerge as the leader of integrated Europe.
This Globalist Document is excerpted from President Roh Moo-hyun’s address on March 1, 2005, at
the Ceremony for the 86th March First Independence Movement Day
http://www.theglobalist.com
Masa Son -- An Outsider in Japan
By Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, June 30, 2001
Until the Internet boom fizzled, Softbank's Masa Son was widely seen perhaps as Japan's leading
entrepreneur today. There was a simple reason for this: He is not exactly Japanese. His grandparents
came to Japan from Korea, where his ancestors had been for 21 generations after migrating from
China. In this excerpt adapted from their book, "Thunder from the East," Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl
WuDunn explore Mr. Son's path, which has significance well beyond the bust-up of Internet
entrepreneurs.
If Masa Son (founder of Softbank) had been purely Japanese, he would have had more options open
to him -- and thus might have ended up a faceless banker or bureaucrat. But Son grew up in a small
town on the southern Japanese island of Kyushu.
His father and other Koreans illegally built their houses on land owned by Japan National Railways,
sparking a long-running conflict with the authorities. It was on that land that Son's father raised pigs
and chickens and illicitly made sake. The home brew apparently was lucrative, for he became the first
person in the town to buy a car.
Masa Son's identity as an outsider helped him once he became entrepreneur. It gave him a knack for
adjusting to new situations.
In those days, Koreans in Japan were effectively persecuted -- meaning that they were virtually barred
from the nation's best schools, from the most prestigious corporations, and from Japanese citizenship.
Son's Korean nationality cast a shadow over his boyhood, particularly when his family moved out of
their Korean neighborhood so that the young Son could attend a better Japanese school. To try to
melt into society, the family took on a Japanese last name, Yasumoto.
Adapting to the surroundings
He took on his Korean-Chinese name, Son, only when he went to America at 16 to go to high school -and then on to the University of California at Berkeley. It was his American experience, he says, that
laid the groundwork for his career.
"My learning experience in the United States made me think much more open-mindedly," said Son. "If
I had stayed all the time in Japan, I probably would have become much more conservative, just as
other Japanese."
Life as a chameleon
Son's identity as an outsider helped him in some ways once he became entrepreneur. He developed a
knack for adjusting to new situations, and he sometimes comes across as a chameleon.
He can backslap and guffaw and jabber in colloquial English with U.S. investment bankers and
discuss the details of new computer chips with the techies. Then, he can turn somber -- and bow and
spew out honorifics in polite Japanese to blend into a Japanese business crowd.
Opportunity in crisis
The Asian economic crisis also opened more doors for outsiders, people like Son who had no chance
to climb a safe corporate ladder and were forced to take risks in high-tech start-ups. In the past,
outsiders were simply locked out of the establishment -- no financing, no connections, no contracts
steered their way. But now, rigidities are finally softening and the rigid segmentation in society is
breaking down.
Outsiders are building bridges into the establishment. Even pure salarymen are journeying over those
bridges, leaving their corporate careers behind them. High-tech companies in Japan are strengthening
their ties to research universities to develop future research. And there is much more collaboration
among different parts of corporate society.
http://www.welt.de
Japans Angst vor Korea
Von Joachim Staat 11. Februar 2006
Der kleine Rio lehrt Japan das Fürchten. Er ist fast so gut wie der Yaris - aber 3000 Euro billiger. So
war's früher mit den Japanern in Deutschland. Jetzt sind sie selber dran
Es gibt keine Kleinen mehr, hat Rudi Völler gesagt. Und meinte damit den Fußball und Zwerge wie die
Färöer, die die deutschen Nationalkicker ganz schön kleingemacht haben. Aber irgendwie gilt der
Rudi-Spruch auch für Autos: Wo sind sie geblieben, die typischen Kleinen? Was früher mal als
Kleinwagen daherkam, ist mittlerweile erstaunlich gewachsen, sicher wie die Bank von England.
Jedenfalls blüht in dieser Klasse eine bunte Vielfalt, die Autokäufer je nach Laune verwirrt oder erfreut.
Als die Japaner vor vielen Jahrzehnten nach Deutschland kamen, haben sie in Sachen Preis und
Qualität vorgemacht, wie's geht. Ein Schock für die deutsche, die europäische Konkurrenz. Doch nun
sind sie selber dran, gehören zum ersten Mal zu den Gejagten im Zwergensegment. Der
Herausforderer kommt gleich von nebenan - aus Korea. Zum Beispiel der Kia Rio.
Der tritt gegen den neuen Yaris von Toyota an. Und da gibt es was zum Fürchten. Fangen wir mit
Zahlen an: Was ist überhaupt ein Kleinwagen? Traditionell mißt so ein Auto rund 3,80 Meter, ist damit
einen Schuhkarton kürzer als der Golf. In dieses Maß paßt am besten der neue Yaris.
Der ist nun elf Zentimeter länger als sein Vorgänger, aber um Meilen gewachsen. Erstens optisch, weil
Toyota endlich ein markantes Markengesicht gefunden hat, das dem Yaris Profil gibt. Zweitens
technisch, weil der Kleine konsequent dort besser geworden ist, wo wir früher gemeckert haben. Die
hohen Türen fallen nun satt statt blechern ins Schloß, man sitzt vernünftig hinterm höhen- wie
längsverstellbaren Lenkrad, und das alufarbene Dekor auf der Mittelkonsole verbreitet gar ein wenig
Glanz.
Verblüffend, wieviel Platz das hohe Dach auf so kurzem Raum schafft. Und wie variabel der Yaris ist:
Rückbank längs verschieben, umbauen, doppelter Ladeboden und am Ende der größte Kofferraum
(1183 Liter dachhoch beladen) - es steckt viel Gehirnschmalz im Heck. Ja, die Entwickler haben sich
intensiv mit dem Kleinen beschäftigt. Die Lenkung arbeitet nun feiner, das Fahrwerk wirkt so souverän
wie bei einem Größeren.
Dennoch wachsen auch bei Toyota, einst gerühmt für unerreichte Qualität, die Bäume nicht in den
Himmel: Der Handschuhfachdeckel sitzt schief, Plastikteile am Türgriff sind schlecht entgratet.
Offensichtlich hat der japanische Ehrgeiz in Sachen Verarbeitung nachgelassen. Und das bei
gesalzenen Preisen. 16 550 Euro kostet der feine Yaris "Executive" mit Klimaautomatik und dem
schlüssellosen Türöffner "Smart Key". Verzichtbarer Luxus, doch für den Sol eine Stufe tiefer (nur mit
Klimaanlage) sind immer noch selbstbewußte 15 150 Euro fällig - klein ist an Toyotas Preisliste nicht
mehr viel. Selbst die 87-PS-Basis kostet schon 13 750 Euro.
Wenn hier einer was wagt, dann Kia. Beim Rio EX sind sechs Airbags, Radio, Klimaanlage und
neuerdings ESP schon drin, und das für 11 910 Euro. Los geht es sogar schon bei 10 780 Euro.
Hoppla, das ist klein! Oder groß. Und Geld spielt in dieser Klasse eine wichtige, wenn nicht alles
entscheidende Rolle. Kia bietet einfach viel Auto fürs Geld. Man sucht förmlich nach den Haken an
diesem Schnäppchen, und es gibt sie. Das Fahrwerk poltert derbe über schlechte Straßen, der
Schalthebel labbert in seiner Führung, und das Plastik oben am Cockpit schreit nach
Entfettungsspray. Aber das war's, der Rest überzeugt. So sehr, daß mich der Kia völlig überrascht hat.
Ein solider Koreaner mit kleinen Mängeln, aber ohne Durchhänger. Das Auto ist geräumig,
ausreichend variabel (umlegbare Rückbank) und flott. Die Bremsen leisten sich keine Schwäche,
ebensowenig das jetzt serienmäßige ESP.
Im Rio verwöhnen mich viele Aufmerksamkeiten: Fahrersitz in Höhe und Neigung verstellbar,
Armlehne, vier Fensterheber, schöner Radioklang, drei Jahre Garantie, dem Motor reicht Normal. Da
sehe ich den Rio mit anderen Augen. Es gibt noch Kleine, im Preis. Was für eine große Einsicht.
http://www.csmonitor.com
Japan: A booming 'Koreatown'
Osaka's Koreatown, once an alienated community, is now thriving as Japanese recognize similarities
between the two cultures.
By Takehiko Kambayashi Correspondent / May 19, 2009
OSAKA, JAPAN – A once-isolated community in a drab quarter of this city seems to be one of the few
vibrant places in a shrinking economy.
Since the 2002 soccer World Cup was cohosted by South Korea and Japan, Osaka’s Koreatown has
grown in popularity among Japanese enchanted by Korean food, music, and the community itself.
An increasing number of Japanese stroll the quarter-mile-long narrow street lined with about 120
shops, including Korean restaurants, butchers, barbecue eateries, and seaweed and kimchi stores.
Half are owned by Koreans. Some come to study how Koreans and Japanese coexist in light of the
two nations’ history of ill feelings.
“This area used to be so alienated, very few Japanese would bother to come,” says Eiichi Shiroyama,
a third-generation Korean who owns a traditional clothing shop. “Coming here, they learn there’s not
much difference between us.”
Issei Shibayama agrees. He’s a city council member in Inuyama, in central Japan, who travels to the
area with 40 other members of a Korean language class. When he visited South Korea 26 years ago,
he recalls that he “was totally shocked, as if I had met [my] twin brother for the first time in life.... The
country with similar culture exists next to Japan.... I wondered why our generation had grown up
without knowing it.”
Schoolchildren come here on field trips. Joo Hyou-ja, who runs a kimchi shop, lets every child try her
products. “I want Japanese children to taste the Korean specialty,” she says.
“Many children say they feel something familiar to Korean culture,” says Kazuhiro Kimura, director at
Korea Japan Center. “That is what we are aiming for.”