The leaders of South Korea and Japan pledged at a rare summit in Tokyo their readiness to end a long-simmering dispute that had hurt security and trade tries, and work with their mutual US ally to counter threats from the likes of North Korea.
(Bloomberg) — The leaders of South Korea and Japan pledged at a rare summit in Tokyo their readiness to end a long-simmering dispute that had hurt security and trade tries, and work with their mutual US ally to counter threats from the likes of North Korea.
President Yoon Suk Yeol smiled as he shook hands with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Thursday at the first formal summit since 2011 between the neighbors held on Japanese soil. Before the two met, North Korea fired off an intercontinental ballistic missile designed to carry a nuclear warhead to the US mainland, underscoring the need for security cooperation.
“The cherry blossoms flowered in Tokyo this week, and we have thrown off a long winter by welcoming the first bilateral visit by a South Korean president in about 12 years,” Kishida said. The two leaders told reporters they had agreed to resume shuttle diplomacy that had been suspended for years due to political acrimony. Kishida said he was looking to visit South Korea at an appropriate time.
Japan and South Korea will restart a security dialog that had been halted and launch a new economic security forum, Kishida said and Yoon offered assurances on advancing a military intelligence-sharing pact that had once been threatened as ties frayed.
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“Japan shares universal values such as freedom, human rights, and the rule of law with the ROK,” Yoon told Kishida, referring to his country by its formal name.
Tokyo signaled its willingness to reconcile earlier in the day by announcing it would lift export controls on three key materials used in chipmaking by South Korean giants such as Samsung Electronics Co. The restrictions had affected South Korea’s high-tech companies when they were imposed in 2019.
Yoon has been working to rebuild trust after relations with Japan turned their coldest in decades under his predecessor, hampering US efforts to cooperate with allies to face up to an increasingly powerful China. A dispute over whether Japan had sufficiently compensated for its past colonization of the Korean Peninsula threatened cooperation from trade to security.
The US has been seeking help from major chipmakers, including South Korea and Japan, to secure supply chains that are less reliant on China. It has also imposed sweeping curbs on the sale of advanced semiconductor equipment to prevent the world’s second-largest economy’s progress in a range of cutting-edge technologies that could threaten America’s status as the world’s preeminent power.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman hinted that Japan and South Korea — which both list Beijing as their top trading partner — should be cautious when it comes to the curbs. “We oppose certain countries’ attempt to form exclusive circles and hope Japan and ROK relations can move forward in a way conducive to regional peace, stability and prosperity,” Wang Wenbin said at a briefing in Beijing.
Yoon this month unveiled a proposal to end a dispute over compensation for Japan’s use of Korean forced labor during its 1910-45 occupation of the peninsula. He plans to have South Korean firms pay into a fund offering compensation for Koreans conscripted to work at Japanese mines and factories during the colonial period.
The payments are meant to avoid forcing Japanese companies to provide compensation, in line with Tokyo’s contention that all such claims were settled under a 1965 agreement.
Restoring ties could open new areas of cooperation with the US. While Yoon had stepped up security cooperation with Washington and Tokyo, including three-way drills in international waters off the Korean Peninsula, deeper ties were difficult as long as South Korea was expecting Japanese companies to pay victims.
About 57% of Japanese in a poll by Kyodo News said they supported the deal, yet nearly 60% of respondents in a Gallup Korea poll were opposed to the plan in South Korea where animosity still simmers over colonial rule and many feel Japan hasn’t shown proper contrition for the harm caused during occupation.
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North Korea, meanwhile, has fired off a barrage of missiles in the past month designed to hit South Korea and Japan, which host the bulk of American troops in the region, as well as the ICBM to strike the US mainland.
–With assistance from Lucille Liu.
(Updates with comments from news conference.)
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