2006

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• Abe fails to quell calls for debate on going nuclear
  By David Pilling
  Published: November 9 2006 01:59 | Last updated: November 9 2006 01:59
  Shinzo Abe, who is watching July’s tricky upper house elections in Japan nervously, has successfully stamped out any talk of a tax increase, never a popular subject as polls approach. Only if the prime minister survives next summer’s electoral test will the unpleasant business of tax rises be brought out of the closet.
  But Mr Abe has been less successful at quelling discussion of another incendiary topic: nuclear armament.
  North Korea’s testing of a nuclear weapon last month triggered calls from some senior government officials to open a debate, long taboo in Japan, on the possibility of going nuclear. Mr Abe moved to douse such talk, telling parliament that his government remained fully committed to its three non-nuclear principles – not to possess, to make or to accept nuclear weapons in Japan. Hiroshi Suzuki, the deputy cabinet secretary, told the Financial Times: “There’s no discussion whatsoever on this issue. Japan’s position is clear, principled and solid.” Yet some of Mr Abe’s closest colleagues do not seem to be listening. This week Shoichi Nakagawa, the Liberal Democratic party’s policy chief and a close friend of Mr Abe’s, said a debate was called for, a stance also backed by Taro Aso, the foreign minister. Mr Nakagawa, who had previously asserted there was nothing in Japan’s pacifist constitution to prevent it from possessing nuclear warheads, went so far as to question reliance on the US’s nuclear umbrella, the sine qua non of Japan’s non-nuclear stance. “Are we all right being held in the arms of the US?” he asked.
• Aso should be axed for nuke comments: opposition
  By MASAMI ITO Staff writer Friday, Nov. 10, 2006
  The Democratic Party of Japan, the Japanese Communist Party, the Social Democratic Party of Japan and the People's New Party sent a letter to the prime minister Thursday demanding that Foreign Minister Taro Aso be dismissed for saying Japan must debate whether to go nuclear. The written request, given to Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Hakubun Shimomura, demanded that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe immediately discharge Abe for statements they said "counter national policy." They asked the prime minister to respond by Nov. 17. Since North Korea's nuclear test in early October, both Aso and Liberal Democratic Party policy chief Shoichi Nakagawa have said several times that Japan should debate whether to develop nuclear weapons. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Nuclearisation]
• Japan's Moves to Revise "Pacifist Constitution" Assailed
  Pyongyang, November 9 (KCNA) -- Members of civic organizations affiliated to the "south Korean committee for south Korea-Japan joint actions" called a press conference together with members of Japanese civic organizations in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul on Nov. 3 to bitterly denounce Japan's moves to revise the "pacifist constitution," according to a press report. Speakers at the press conference referred to the fact that the Japanese government is becoming evermore undisguised in its moves to revise the "pacifist constitution" in a bid to revive militarism, adding that these moves indicate Japan's renewed attempt to emerge "a leader of Asia" and embark upon the road of reinvasion.
• Japan's Dangerous Design for Overseas Expansion Blasted
     Pyongyang, November 7 (KCNA) -- The new Japanese chief executive, addressing a recent meeting of the House of Councilors of the Japanese Diet, asserted that the existing constitution was adopted according to a coercive intention of the occupation forces without getting the agreement of the people and it was necessary, therefore, to adopt a new constitution agreed upon by the people. Minju Joson Tuesday observes in a signed commentary in this regard:     Lurking behind the reckless remarks of the new chief executive of Japan which regards militaristic overseas expansion as the task of its policy is a very dangerous aim that should never be overlooked [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Japan, U.S. Plan Joint Air, Naval Drills
  By REUTERS Published: November 7, 2006 Filed at 3:28 a.m. ET
  TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan and the United States said on Tuesday they will hold joint air and naval exercises for a week from Thursday in waters and airspace around Japan. The exercises come at a time when the international community is trying to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions. North Korea agreed to return to stalled six-party talks on ending its nuclear weapons program last week, about three weeks after Pyongyang staged its first nuclear test. The U.S. Navy said it would send about a dozen warships for the drills, including the USS Kitty Hawk aircraft carrier and the USS Shiloh, which is equipped with the high-tech Aegis radar system and SM-3 missiles intended to shoot down incoming ballistic missiles. About 90 Japanese warships and 170 aircraft will take part in the joint naval exercises with the United States in waters including the Sea of Japan, the Japanese defense ministry official said. [Joint US military] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Internment Without Charges: Dorothea Lange and the Censored Images of Japanese American Internment
  By Linda Gordon
  [Japan Focus 6 November 2006]
  In 1942 the U.S. War Relocation Authority hired documentary photographer Dorothea Lange to photograph the World War II internment of approximately 120,000 Japanese Americans. Lange is now a world-famous documentary photographer, best known for chronicling the Great Depression of the 1930s. Her work is the subject of more than a dozen glossy art books. Even those who do not know her name will recognize some of her pictures. One of her photographs has been called the most famous image in the U.S.
• Spokesman for DPRK Foreign Ministry on Japan's Attitude toward Resumption of Six-Party Talks
     Pyongyang, November 4 (KCNA) -- A spokesman for the DPRK Foreign Ministry gave the following answer to a question put by KCNA on Nov. 4 as regards Japan's senseless behavior regarding the resumption of the six-party talks: As already reported, bilateral and multi-lateral contacts with main emphasis on the contact between the DPRK and the U.S. took place in Beijing on Oct. 31. The DPRK, accordingly, decided to return to the six-party talks on the premise that the issue of lifting the financial sanctions would be discussed and settled at an early date between the DPRK and the U.S. within the framework of the six-party talks.     The international community is now unanimous in hailing the agreement on the resumption of the six-party talks, while highly praising the DPRK's invariable stand and sincere efforts for the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.     But it is only Japan that expressed its wicked intention, letting loose with a spate of balderdashes.
  The DPRK has never asked Japan to participate in the six-party talks.     In fact, it was displeased with Japan's participation in the six-party talks, but has properly treated it, taking the relations with other participating countries into consideration.     It is the view of the DPRK that since the U.S. attends the six-party talks, there is no need for Japan to participate in them as a local delegate because it is no more than a state of the U.S. and it is enough for Tokyo just to be informed of the results of the talks by Washington.     The Japanese government, quite new as it is, must have a lot to do internally. It had better, therefore, mind its own business instead of poking its nose into the work of the talks to its inconvenience.     It would be much better for Japan to refrain from participating in the six-party talks and less attendants would be not bad for making the talks fruitful.
• Dokdo Needs to Be Better Explained to Foreigners
  By Tony MacGregor contributing writer
  DOKDO _ Koreans are leaving no stone unturned in promoting the Dokdo Islets as Korean territory. Unfortunately, they're too often preaching to the converted. Two rocky islets surrounded by 33 smaller rocks, the Dokdos are located about 90 kilometers east of South Korea's Ullungdo Island in the East Sea. They are claimed by Japan, which calls them Takeshima, and are located 157 kilometers northwest of Japan's Oki Islands. On a recent visit to the island of Ulleungdo, I discovered that the modernistic Dokdo Museum on the island had almost no signs in English and only one brochure in English. I haven't met a Korean yet who didn't passionately believe that the Dokdos are Korean and would even go to war to defend them. [SK Japan relations]

• Time to End the Korean War: The Korean Nuclear Crisis in the Era of Unification
  By Sheila Miyoshi Jager
  When North Korea went ahead with its nuclear test on October 9, 2006 in defiance of China’s objections, the Bush administration had hoped that Pyongyang’s brazen act would finally create the necessary momentum to precipitate a strategic shift in China’s and South Korea’s view of North Korea. The two countries hold the key to Pyongyang’s economic survival and both countries have been reluctant to pursue policies that might lead to its collapse and regional upheaval. Yet, the initial optimism by the Bush administration that a unified policy on North Korea would at last be reached on the basis of full implementation of the final U.N. Security Council Resolution on North Korea was, in fact, misplaced. Despite Pyongyang’s defiance, deep divisions between China and the United States and between South Korea and the United States over the fate of North Korea still exist over what to do about that recalcitrant regime.
• Shinzo Abe Pressures Public Broadcaster
  [Opinion] Prime minister will order NHK to 'pay attention' to the North Korean Abductions issue
    Christopher Salzberg (gyaku) Published 2006-10-28 16:29 (KST)   In a move that immediately sparked protests, Japan's new prime minister Abe Shinzo, less than a month after taking office, has declared that his government will direct "special orders" to the influential public broadcaster NHK demanding that it "pay attention" to the North Korea abductions issue. [1,2]
    Associated Press reports that "the Ministry of Internal Affairs will ask a regulatory council to approve ordering state-owned Japan Broadcasting Corp., or NHK, to boost coverage of abductions in its overseas shortwave radio broadcasts," in order to, among other things, "raise international awareness of the abductees' plight," according to ministry official Osumi Yutaka. Abe told reporters that the government must take "appropriate action as we think about what can be done for the sake of the victims who are waiting in North Korea for us to rescue them." In response, NHK stated that it already gives enough attention to the abductions issue and that it aimed to continue to do so under "independent editorship." [2] [Media] [Human rights] Abductees] [Japanese remilitarisation] [Abe Shinzo]
• Japan bans all trade with North Korea
  · Angry Tokyo closes ports to ships in unilateral move · Pyongyang threatens US with new nuclear test Ewen MacAskill and Jonathan Watts in Beijing Thursday October 12, 2006 The Guardian
  Japan unilaterally imposed fresh sanctions on North Korea yesterday, including a ban on shipping, as Pyongyang warned it would consider US pressure "a declaration of war". Three days after North Korea claimed it had conducted its first nuclear test, there was no sign of tension subsiding. Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, unwilling to wait for the UN security council, announced a total trade ban on North Korea. All its ships will be denied entry to Japanese ports. As he spoke, about two dozen North Korean ships lay idle in Japanese ports yesterday with no dockers to unload them. [Sanctions]
• Japanese Reactionaries' Ill-boding Military Moves under Fire
  Pyongyang, October 11 (KCNA) -- The Japanese reactionaries are getting themselves busy with the arrangements to upgrade the Defence Agency into a ministry and set up a "strategic planning office" inside the agency. This is nothing but moves to convert Japan into a military power and round off the preparations for a war of aggression overseas. Minju Joson Wednesday observes this in a signed commentary [Japanese remilitarisation]
• The Start of a Thaw in Korea-Japan Relations?
  President Roh Moo-hyun and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe met Monday amid the shockwaves from North Korea's nuclear test. The two leaders at the last minute scrapped a joint press release they had planned to put out after the summit and instead held separate press conferences to express their own positions. That means the pair failed to reach any concrete agreement or make any joint decisions. Still, the summit is a first step to normalizing a bilateral relationship that had been going from bad to worse.
• Roh, Abe agree on North Korea but not much else
    October 10, 2006 ? President Roh Moo-hyun said he found "no different views" from those of Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, in their condemnation of North Korea's nuclear test. Mr. Roh was speaking at a press conference after he met the visiting Japanese leader. Shortly after his appearance, Mr. Abe met the press separately. "I found common ground with Mr. Abe in that North Korea's nuclear test is not pardonable, calm and strategic countermoves are needed and the United Nations and the involved nations need to coordinate their moves," Mr. Roh told reporters. He praised the cooperation Seoul, Washington and Tokyo have shown in addressing the North Korean nuclear issue. Mr. Abe also stressed that he and Mr. Roh had a meeting of the minds, at least on North Korea, but was speaking alone at a Seoul hotel. No joint statement was issued after the two men met. A senior Korean official suggested that the two men found no common ground on issues other than North Korea and cited differences between China and Korea in their willingness to seek better ties with Japan. He said, "The two leaders met for the first time today and they have separate understandings of history. Today they presented their stances. We could not reach an agreement on a statement that we can jointly announce." He continued, "We could not make an agreement on the level of the China-Japan joint statement because we do not have the same historical understanding as that between China and Japan." The first meeting of Japanese and Korean leaders in 11 months began at 3 p.m. at the Blue House. Originally, Korean officials said, Mr. Roh's emphasis in the meeting was to have been on Japan's recounting of its imperial past and actions that seemed to Koreans to justify its colonial rule and wartime atrocities. The North Korean weapons test yesterday morning changed all that. But Mr. Roh told the press he had asked for "sincere Japanese efforts" to remove the history-related irritants, including visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, textbook treatment of Japan's history in the first half of the 20th century and its use of Korean women as prostitutes for its military during World War II. Mr. Roh quoted Mr. Abe as reaffirming apologies by senior Japanese officials in 1993 and 1995, but said the Japanese leader was ambiguous about whether he would continue his predecessor's practice of visiting the controversial shrine.   by Chun Su-jin
• Seoul's Summits With Japan, China Crucial in Nuke Crisis
    Hu, Abe Join Hands Over N.Korea's Nuke Test Threat
  President Roh Moo-hyun meets Japan's new Prime Minister Abe Shinzo on Monday and Chinese President Hu Jintao on Friday to discuss ways of stopping North Korea from conducting a nuclear test. But prospects are anything but rosy, with some pundits saying even the combined thrust of Seoul, Beijing and Tokyo is not enough to put direct pressure on Pyongyang to desist.
• Abe's Holiday Travel -- Deja Vu ?
  [Analysis] Japan PM's planned tour of Beijing, Seoul raises hopes and concerns
    Hisane Masaki (hmasaki) Published 2006-10-06 13:40 (KST)   For many observers of the Japanese diplomatic scene, it may look like deja vu. Japan's new prime minister, Shinzo Abe, will make a speedy fence-mending tour of two Asian neighbors soon, just as his predecessor did five years ago. That trip proved later on to be a complete failure. Will the new one be any different?
      The trip will take Abe to Beijing on Sunday for talks with top Chinese leaders President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao, and then to Seoul for talks with President Roh Moo-hyun the following day, which falls on a national holiday in Japan. The visits will be Abe's first overseas since he took office on September 26, succeeding Junichiro Koizumi. This underscores the importance Abe, a conservative hawk, attaches to mending the deep rift in political relations with the Asian neighbors -- the negative legacy left by his predecessor -- early in his new administration. It is rare for a Japanese premier to make an overseas trip so soon after being elected.
• Roh plans private talks with both Abe and Hu
    October 05, 2006 ? President Roh Moo-hyun is scheduled to meet one-on-one with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Monday in Seoul and with Chinese President Hu Jintao on Friday in Beijing, the Blue House officially announced Wednesday. The Blue House chief security advisor, Song Min-soon, said that the peaceful resolution of the North Korean nuclear issue would be a significant item on the table. The series of summit meetings follows Pyongyang's announced plan to conduct a nuclear test.
• 60th Anniversary of Secondary Education of Koreans in Japan Marked
  Tokyo, October 2 (KNS-KCNA) -- A grand festival of Koreans in Japan took place in Osaka on Oct. 1 to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the enforcement of the secondary education of Koreans in Japan. Present there were Chairman So Man Sul, Chief Vice-Chairman Ho Jong Man and other vice-chairmen of the Central Standing Committee of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon), the chairman of the Central Audit Committee, the director general of the Secretariat of Chongryon, the director of the History Institute of Korean Residents in Japan, advisors and department directors of the Central Standing Committee of Chongryon, chairmen of Chongryon Headquarters in the Kinki area, leading officials of organizations and enterprises and chairmen of associations of Korean workers in commerce in Japan. It was attended by at least 32,000 Koreans from all walks of life in different parts of Japan including Kinki. They included Koreans of the first generation, persons of merit, educators and Koreans in commerce and industry who have been active ever since the very start of national education. Among those present on invitation were Japanese figures from all walks of life and foreigners.
• Japan Presses for U.N. Stand on N.Korea Nuclear Vow
  By REUTERS Published: October 5, 2006 Filed at 2:37 a.m. ET
  TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan pressed on with efforts on Thursday to secure a U.N. condemnation of North Korea's nuclear test threat after Washington, in its starkest warning so far, said it would not live with a nuclear-armed Pyongyang.
• Roh to Meet Abe, Hu
  By Ryu Jin Staff Reporter
  President Roh Moo-hyun will hold summits with Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and China's President Hu Jintao next week to discuss the North Korean nuclear threat and other international and bilateral issues, Chong Wa Dae announced yesterday. Roh will meet with Abe on Oct. 9 in Seoul, presidential spokesman Yoon Tai-young said in a press briefing. Before arriving in Seoul, Abe will visit Beijing on Oct. 8 for talks with Hu. The spokesman said Roh would also make a one-day visit to Beijing on Oct. 13. The triangular summits come at a time when Pyongyang has threatened to conduct a nuclear test to prove its deterrent against the United States.
• Han rejects historical, territorial land claims
    October 04, 2006 ? As South Korea marked the 4,338th anniversary of its national foundation day, Prime Minister Han Myeong-sook vowed yesterday to firmly preserve the country's sovereignty over its territory and history against Japanese and Chinese attempts to lay claim to them. "The Korean nation has made history without yielding to numerous challenges from inside and outside the country, but there are moves to distort that history," Ms. Han said, speaking at a commemoration ceremony in Seoul. "I'm deeply concerned about that." She referred to Japan's claim to ownership of the Dokdo islets in the East Sea (Sea of Japan) and China's alleged attempts to distort the history of the ancient Korean kingdom of Goguryeo. "The Dokdo islets are undoubtedly our national territory and Goguryeo and other ancient kingdoms founded by our nation shine in our history," she said. "I will preserve the sovereignty of our territory and history based on objective research by the Northeast Asian History Foundation that was launched on Sept. 28." The foundation was formed to rebut historical claims by China. [Koguryo]
• Japan's Launch of Orbiting Solar Observatory under Fire
  Pyongyang, October 3 (KCNA) -- Japan launched the 7th M5 rocket loaded with an orbiting solar observatory recently. Japan in July decided to call off the launch of this observatory because it costs a colossal sum to the tune of 8 billion yen. It, however, launched another orbiting solar observatory, rescinding the decision. Commenting on this, a Rodong Sinmun analyst Tuesday says: This was intended to step up the conversion of the country into a military power under the cloak of "scientific researches." The Japanese militarists are whipping themselves into frenzy to realize in the new century at whatever cost their old dream of "the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere" which they failed to carry into reality in the past. Japan does not hide the fact that the recent launch almost confirmed the technology of a rocket propelled by solid fuel. [Rocketry]
• Japanese Supreme Court's Unjust Ruling Dismissed
  Pyongyang, October 3 (KCNA) -- A meeting was held in Tokyo on Sept. 28 to condemn the Japanese Supreme Court for giving an unreasonable verdict to Kang Yong Gwan, former director of the Financial Department of the Central Standing Committee of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon). Present at the meeting were officials of the Chongryon Central Standing Committee including Ho Jong Man, chief vice-chairman, Ko Tok U, vice-chairman and director in charge of the living of Koreans in Japan, Pae Jin Gu, secretary general, and other compatriots.
• Japan Leader's First Diplomatic Bow Is to Asian Neighbors
  By MARTIN FACKLER Published: October 4, 2006 TOKYO, Oct. 3 - The newly installed administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is moving rapidly to improve estranged relations with his nation's closest Asian neighbors, China and South Korea. [The Japanese prime minister will visit Beijing on Sunday, where he will meet with President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao, the government announced Wednesday, according to Reuters. He will then fly to South Korea to meet President Roh Moo-hyun on Monday.] The trip constitutes an early diplomatic victory for the new prime minister, who assumed office on Sept. 26. Both China and South Korea had refused such summit meetings with Mr. Abe's predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, in anger over his annual visits to a Tokyo shrine honoring Japan's war dead, including convicted war criminals from World War II. Mr. Abe has refused to say whether he will visit the shrine, called Yasukuni. By making such an overseas trip so early in his tenure, Mr. Abe apparently will also be trying to allay concerns that his more assertive brand of nationalism and hawkish stance on defense would further damage ties with Asian neighbors.
• Toyota's U.S. Sales Surge As General Motors Stalls
• Abe, Roh rush to a summit on Monday
    October 03, 2006 ? TOKYO ? Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wants to visit Beijing on Sunday and meet with President Roh Moo-hyun the following day, diplomatic sources said yesterday. Kyodo News Agency carried similar reports on Sunday, citing sources it did not identify. A press release yesterday by Japan's Foreign Ministry indicated that a meeting between Mr. Roh and Mr. Abe was imminent but gave no date. It said the two nations' foreign ministers talked by phone yesterday and pledged to make the summit meeting successful despite the short preparation time. In Seoul, a government official said yesterday the Monday meeting date would be announced Wednesday morning, but would not say so for attribution. Both governments have been circling warily to find a formula for resuming leadership contacts. Mr. Abe's predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, had angered China and Korea by visiting the Yasukuni Shrine, where executed war criminals as well as other war dead are commemorated, leading to a boycott by Japan's neighbors
  Finally, these sources said, the two governments settled on a visit by Mr. Abe on Monday, a day after he will be in China to meet President Hu Jintao. A Japanese diplomat said a bit cryptically yesterday that Mr. Abe was pressing for quick meetings, judging that "political difficulties" might make them less likely in the future. "We thought that the South Korean and Chinese government would think the same way," the official said.
• Japan Softens on Shrine Visits
  By Ryu Jin Staff Reporter South Korea has once again reminded Japan that the two sides could hardly mend fences if the latter's new leader visits Yasukuni Shrine and Tokyo said it understands Seoul's position, diplomatic sources said Monday. While discussing holding a summit between their leaders, South Korean officials voiced their objections to a visit by Shinzo Abe, the new Japanese prime minister, to the controversial war shrine, the sources said. Abe, who became prime minister last week, proposed summits with his South Korean and Chinese counterparts to improve bilateral ties, chilled by his predecessor Junichiro Koizumi's repeated visits to the shrine. [Yasukuni] [Abe Shinzo]
• Realpolitik Is the Only Way Forward With Japan
        A Korea-Japan summit in Seoul in the wake of the Chuseok holidays seems a foregone conclusion. It will be the first chance for the two heads of state to sit down together after a long chill in relations, an opportunity provided by the election of Japan's new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe last week. Seoul-Tokyo relations have hit rock-bottom. The responsibility lies first of all with the Japanese government. During his tenure, Abe's predecessor Junichiro Koizumi kept visiting the militarist Yasukuni Shrine, and his administration distorted history in textbooks and claimed territorial rights to Korea's Dokdo islets, thereby causing incessant conflict with Korea and China. At the summit, Abe should make it clear that he wants to see the Korea-Japan relations and the Asian diplomacy ruined by his predecessor restored. He should put an end to provocations like visits to Yasukuni shrine that deny Japan's responsibility for its past.
• Japan's Abe Seeks Talks With China, South Korea
  New Premier Aims to Ease Tensions With 2 Neighbors
  By Anthony Faiola Washington Post Foreign Service Tuesday, October 3, 2006; Page A12
  TOKYO, Oct. 2 -- Seeking to mend Japan's deteriorating relations with its neighbors, Japanese officials on Monday said they were moving quickly to arrange summit meetings between freshly inaugurated Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his counterparts in China and South Korea. Officials here cautioned that negotiations with one or both nations might yet break down. But widespread Japanese media reports indicated that Abe plans to hold talks with Chinese President Hu Jintao on Sunday and to see South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun the next day.
  Scoring such summits so early in his tenure would mark a symbolic breakthrough for Abe, 52, who succeeded Junichiro Koizumi as prime minister on Sept. 26. China and South Korea have boycotted top-level meetings with Japan since last year, citing Koizumi's annual visits to Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine, which honors Japan's military dead, including convicted World War II criminals. Japan's relations with both nations have also sharply deteriorated over territorial disputes. Tensions between China and Japan center on drilling rights in the East China Sea, an issue that has increasingly concerned the United States. Japan's schism with South Korea over disputed islets, meanwhile, has helped plunge relations between Washington's two most important allies in the region to their lowest point since the end of World War II. "I plan to develop forward-looking relations with our important neighbors, China and South Korea, by building mutual understanding through dialogue and cooperation in every possible level and area," Abe told reporters in Tokyo on Monday. Analysts were quick to lower expectations for a long-term easing of tensions in the region -- largely because Abe's positions on the issues dividing Japan from its neighbors are at least as hard-line as Koizumi's.
• Korea-Japan Summit Likely in Seoul Next Week
  A summit between Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is likely to take place in Seoul early next week after the Oct. 4-8 Chusok holiday ends, government sources said yesterday.
• Abe may come here in mid-October
    September 30, 2006 ? President Roh Moo-hyun and Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, will meet "by the middle of next month, after the Chuseok holidays," a senior Blue House official said privately yesterday. The comments signaled an end to Mr. Roh's refusal to meet a Japanese leader. Another official here said earlier yesterday that Tokyo had proposed next Saturday for a meeting of the two men, to be followed by a similar meeting of the Chinese and Japanese leaders the following day. The senior Blue House official said the meeting of the two leaders would be held in Seoul. Mr. Roh and Mr. Abe agreed to meet "at a proper time" on Thursday, in their first phone conversation after Mr. Abe's election by the lower house of the Japanese Diet. The official said the meeting could take place before Oct. 20, adding that plans are also being made for a meeting of China's president, Hu Jintao, and Mr. Roh in mid-October.
• Terrorism against Chongryon Flailed
  Pyongyang, September 28 (KCNA) -- The Japanese ultra right reactionaries on Sept. 16 sent a postal package carrying a letter of blackmail and a cut human finger to the chairman of the Central Standing Committee of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon). A Rodong Sinmun analyst Thursday brands this as an indication of the lengths where the Japanese right-wing reactionaries have gone in their malice and fascist frenzy towards the DPRK and Chongryon. Reviewing terrorism and blackmail against Chongryon and Koreans in Japan which are getting more desperate in Japan these days, the analyst notes that those who have driven things to this extent are the Japanese authorities who are pursuing anti-DPRK, anti-Chongryon hostile acts while steering their policy along the conservative rightist course and the right-wing conservative media acting their trumpeters. It is their political mode to suppress Koreans in Japan, putting them on the altar of the solution of Japan's internal problems and political crisis, the analyst notes, and goes on:
• KCNA Blasts Japan's Financial Sanctions against DPRK
  Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency issued a commentary regarding the Japanese Cabinets "financial sanctions" against the DPRK. The full text of the commentary is as follows. The Japanese Cabinet in its meeting held on September 19 approved the application of "financial sanctions" against the DPRK. This action calling for suspending the remittance and freezing assets targets 15 enterprises and corporations related to the DPRK. It was taken in the wake of the prohibition of the entry of the DPRK liner Mangyongbong-92 into Japanese ports. Japan declared sanctions against more financial institutions and corporations of the DPRK, plus those against which the United States designated as targets of its sanctions. Such shrewd attitude of Japan cannot but arouse the concern of the international community. Why is Japan becoming so zealous in the sanctions against the DPRK? The financial sanctions taken by Japan against the DPRK cannot be construed otherwise than a politically motivated charade intended to please its American master, pursuant to Washington's hostile policy towards the DPRK.
• Rodong Sinmun Comments on Abe's "New Japan" Plan
  PYONGYANG, September 4 (KCNA) -- The plan for building "new Japan" is intended to establish constitution and state system as a war state and step up its moves for militarization and reinvasion, said Rodong Sinmun on September 4 in a signed commentary. Chief Cabinet Secretary Abe Shinzo, the diplomatic boss and different factions of other ultra-right conservative forces of Japan are making public their own commitments with the president election of the Japan Liberal Democratic Party at hand, the commentary noted, and continued as follows. [Abe Shinzo]

• Abe wins MPs' vote to become Japan's new prime minister
  Justin McCurry in Tokyo Wednesday September 27, 2006 The Guardian
  Shinzo Abe has become Japan's youngest prime minister since the second world war after winning a comfortable majority in a vote among MPs. The hawkish leader named a cabinet created in his own conservative image, appointing several rightwingers to help push through plans for closer security ties with the US, a revision of the constitution to give Japanese troops a bigger military role and the promotion of family values. "It is the beginning of a new era under Mr Abe," said Hidenao Nakagawa, a conservative who was made the Liberal Democratic party's secretary general on Monday.  
• Japan's balancing act
  Simon Tisdall Tuesday September 26, 2006 The Guardian Fairly or not, Junichiro Koizumi is widely held to have dragged down Japan's relations with former wartime enemies China and South Korea to their lowest level since the 1950s. But the Diet's expected appointment today of Shinzo Abe as his successor as prime minister could stoke east Asian tensions and make matters worse. Mr Koizumi's main offence, as seen from Beijing and Seoul, was his repeated visits to Tokyo's Yasukuni shrine where convicted war criminals are honoured along with 2.5 million Japanese war dead. The visits were interpreted, for largely political purposes, as proof that Japan had failed to acknowledge past misdeeds. As a result, there have been no full summit meetings between China and Japan since 2001. That is a bit like Britain and Germany refusing to shake hands 61 years after the shooting stopped.
    If anything, Mr Abe, a third generation neo-nationalist who, at 52, will be Japan's youngest postwar leader, may take a tougher line than his flamboyant predecessor. He has said that any future prime minister should continue to visit Yasukuni. He also rejects the validity of the Tokyo war crimes trials that followed Japan's 1945 defeat and says, in effect, that Japan has done enough apologising.  
• Abe, Roh agree in principle to meet
    September 29, 2006 ? President Roh Moo-hyun, in a telephone call yesterday from Shinzo Abe, Japan's new prime minister, agreed that they should "meet at a proper time to exchange views on ways to advance bilateral ties." Mr. Roh's spokesman, Yoon Tae-young, said plans for a meeting would be discussed in diplomatic channels. The spokesman quoted Mr. Roh as saying, "Mutual trust and respect are the most significant things for the stable development of bilateral relations." He added that Mr. Abe's election as prime minister offered a new opportunity to promote peace in the region. The Japanese leader, Mr. Yoon continued, said he would work to develop friendly and cooperative arrangements. The phone call and the agreement to meet came a day after the Foreign Ministry had steered reporters away from believing that a meeting was in the works. Officials there stressed Korean demands for Tokyo to face up to its imperial past and wartime atrocities and end what Seoul sees as a glorification of that era in Japan. The Blue House denied having conceded anything. A senior official, speaking off the record, emphasized several times in comments to reporters, "We put weight on action, not words."   by Chun Su-jin [Abe] [Japanese colonialism]
• It's time to mend fences with Japan
  [VIEWPOINT] The Japanese government, led by new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, was inaugurated yesterday. As expected, important posts of the Liberal Democratic Party and the cabinet were filled by Mr. Abe's close political aides and ideological colleagues, not distributed among party factions. Thus, the prime minister has direct control of the party and the cabinet, both in name and reality. As those from the conservative right wing of the Liberal Democratic Party are placed in key posts, the attention focuses on the political behavior and policy direction of the prime minister's office, led by Mr. Abe. Mr. Abe is the most conservative prime minister Japan has ever had. If his tendencies get directly reflected in Japan's government policy, the waves in the straits between Korea and Japan will get even rougher. Despite the ideological tendencies of Mr. Abe and other key cabinet ministers, however, the Abe administration is not likely to take a hard- line, one-sided policy toward Korea. Paradoxically enough, there is a strong possibility that the Abe administration will take a more flexible stance and resilient approach to South Korea. [Abe]
• Diplomatic timing critical
  [FOUNTAIN] Former U.S. President Bill Clinton issued Presidential Decision Directive I on the day of his inauguration in January 1993, regarding a reorganization of the National Security Counsel. Four days later, the National Economic Council was created to deal with domestic and foreign economic issues. The council was headed by Robert Rubin. Mr. Rubin was co-chairman of Goldman Sachs, one of the most prestigious investment banks in the world. In January 1995, Mr. Rubin was appointed as Secretary of the Treasury, beginning the era of Rubinomics. Mr. Rubin was on the frontline of economic diplomacy. As the economic crisis hit Asia, the United States moved closer to China. The age of strategic companionship between the United States and China opened. To the United States, China was a regional stabilizer and Japan a passive bystander. What represented the newly defined relationship between the United States and China was the hotline between Mr. Rubin and then-Vice Premier Zhu Rongji, who became the Premier of the People's Republic of China in 1998. It was speculated that Japan had no place in U.S. foreign policy, and the Clinton Administration had virtually sold Taiwan off. Lately, the ice is thawing between Washington and Beijing. The main player this time is Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson.
  The timing of Mr. Paulson is also delicate. Right before visiting China, he met with President Roh Moo-hyun and learned of his East Asian plans. In Japan, Shinzo Abe's new cabinet has just been launched. In an entangled Northeast Asia, a new trend is about to begin. We desperately need a constructive idea to mend the Korea-Japan relationship and build a bridge between China and Japan. After all, the beauty of diplomacy is in the timing.   by Oh Young-hwan The writer is a deputy political news editor at the JoongAng Ilbo. [China confrontation]
• Where will Abe visit first?
  [OUTLOOK] Which country will Japan's new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visit first? This is the most popular issue to talk about when diplomats and journalists stationed in Tokyo and political scientists meet. The safest choice will be the United States. Former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi flew to Camp David only two months after he entered office. Prime Minister Abe thinks the U.S.-Japan alliance is very important, more than anyone else does. But a new prime minister usually feels pressured to show different colors from his or her predecessor. Prime Minister Abe seems to have China on his mind. [Yasukuni]
• Roh, Abe Agree to Meet
  By Ryu Jin Staff Reporter   President Roh Moo-hyun and Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe agreed yesterday to hold a summit ``at an appropriate time'' to discuss ways of improving bilateral relations, the presidential office announced. The agreement was made when Roh received a telephone call from the new Japanese premier in the morning. The two leaders exchanged views on bi-national ties and North Korea's nuclear problem, Chong Wa Dae spokesman Yoon Tai-young said.
• Summit Possible After Japan's Apology
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter   President Roh Moo-hyun is ready to hold summit with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at any time should the new Japanese prime minister demonstrate ``sincere'' attitudes toward resolving disputes between the two neighbors, a senior government official said on Wednesday. ``If Japan shows sincere attitude toward resolving various factors that trigger conflicts, our basic stance is that the summit meeting can occur whenever it is possible,'' Lee Kyu-hyung, vice minister of foreign affairs and trade, told reporters in Seoul. Abe is set to deliver a speech on Friday in which he is expected to clarify his foreign policies.
• Of Abe and his nationalism
   [FOUNTAIN]   "Japan is no longer in the post-war period," declared Japan's 1956 White Paper on Economics. The paper proclaimed that Japan had overcome the devastation of its World War II defeat and entered a growth period. It was around that time that Shintaro Ishihara, the current governor of Tokyo, published "Seasons in the Sun," a book about the liberal sex culture of the young who were not restricted by money. The liberal youth were called the "sun kids." The Japanese economy had completely changed from the situation described in the 1947 White Paper, which described how the government, businesses and households were all in deficit. The economic boom was made possible by the policies of Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida, who prioritized economic issues and cut defense.  
  The national view and patriotism are also his issues. Kyoto University professor Terumasa Nakanishi reportedly had a deep involvement in the policy planning of Mr. Abe. He has called post-war democracy Japan's foremost enemy. A conflict with the old post-war order is inevitable. It is hoped that Mr. Shinzo's attempt does not turn into pre-war nationalism.   by Oh Young-hwan
• Seoul criticizes Tokyo over calls there to rearm
    September 08, 2006 ¤Ñ Vice Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan told his Japanese counterpart, Shotaro Yachi, yesterday that Seoul was concerned about possible changes to Japan's pacifist constitution. A government official, speaking to reporters here on background, described some of the contents of the two men's wide-ranging discussions. He said Mr. Yu also noted that a former Japanese prime minister, Yasuhiro Nakasone, had urged the development of nuclear weapons. The official said Seoul wanted its points noted before a new prime minister is installed in Tokyo next month.   [Japanese remilitarisation] [Nuclearisation] [Threat]
• No good in a nuclear Japan
  [EDITORIALS] Yasuhiro Nakasone, the former Japanese prime minister, said Japan is currently dependent on U.S. nuclear weapons and that the country needs to look into making nuclear weapons in case of a possible upheaval in the international situation, such as a rupture of the U.S.-Japan security treaty. Mr. Nakasone is the chairman of a subcommittee of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party's constitution drafting committee. Shinzo Abe, who is likely to be elected chairman of the Liberal Democratic Party in this month's election and take office next month, also plans to amend the Constitution so as to facilitate Japan's transition into a major military power. It is noteworthy that an unofficial spokesman of Japan's conservative politicians publicly mentioned "the need for nuclear armament," which has been taboo in the country.
  According to the data from its Ministry of National Defense, Japan possesses 15 to 70 tons of plutonium and the world's third- strongest nuclear industrial infrastructure. Unlike North Korea, Japan would be able to develop nuclear weapons in months.   [Japanese remilitarisation] [Nuclearisation] [Threat]  
• Will Japan shed Article 9?
  [FOUNTAIN]   In 1948, the Japanese Ministry of Education published "Atarashii Kenpo no Hanashi," or "Tales of the New Constitution," a commentary on the constitution that was enacted the year before. The book offers a noteworthy interpretation on Article 9. Article 9, also known as the peace clause, forever renounces war and the possession of war potential as well as the right of belligerency. However, the validity of the interpretation expired after only two years, when the Korean War broke out, completely changing the situation. The National Police Reserve was organized, and the National Safety Agency was formed. Tokyo dodged Article 9 with a claim that the two groups were organizations with minimal power. And so an army with no war to fight was born.   [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Overcoming the Yasukuni Issue is Good for Both China and Japan
  by Shen Dingli and Tatsujiro Suzuki
  September 28th, 2006
  Shen Dingli, Executive Dean of Institute of International Studies, and Director of Center for American Studies at Fudan University, Shanghai, and Tatsujiro Suzuki, Visiting Professor of Graduate School of Public Policy at University of Tokyo, Japan, write, "The history issue is an important issue of justice but should not hold the relationship hostage. As a former brutal colonizer, Japan has the moral responsibility to be sensitive and behave honestly while Beijing needs to develop a firm policy that is not subject to nationalism." [Yasukuni]
• Neighbors warily eye better ties under Abe
    September 28, 2006 ? Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon yesterday welcomed the election of Shinzo Abe as prime minister of Japan, saying Seoul was willing to consider a meeting between President Roh Moo-hyun and Mr. Abe. But, he said, there were conditions attached. Speaking to Kyodo News Agency in New York, Mr. Ban said, "We sincerely hope that Prime Minister Abe will learn lessons from what transpired in Prime Minister's Koizumi's administration. That means he should squarely address the issue of our historical legacy. Then we are prepared to have many kinds of high level exchanges and meetings, including summit meetings." In Korea's view Japan continues to glorify its imperial history and refuses to acknowledge colonial and wartime atrocities. Visits by Japan's leaders to a controversial shrine have further soured relations. Japan's new chief cabinet secretary, Yasuhisa Shiozaki, welcomed Mr. Ban's remarks, saying he shared the view that a summit meeting should be held as soon as possible. Not so fast, growled Lee Youn-soo, the Korean Foreign Ministry's press relations chief, telling reporters that Seoul first wanted to see a "sincere attitude" on Tokyo's part. Part of Seoul's caution in reacting to Mr. Shiozaki's call for a quick meeting of the two leaders was Kyodo's interpretation of Mr. Ban's remarks; the Japanese news agency said Seoul was "considering" such a meeting. That, the Foreign Ministry told reporters pointedly, was an overstatement of Seoul's stance. On Tuesday night, the Blue House said President Roh had sent a congratulatory message to Mr. Abe after his election.   by Brian Lee
• Rodong Sinmun Comments on Japan's Launch of Spy Satellite
  Pyongyang, September 26 (KCNA) -- Rodong Sinmun Tuesday in a signed commentary denounces Japan's recent launch of a military spy satellite as part of preparations for reinvasion of the Korean Peninsula and the rest of Asia, a criminal action of seriously threatening peace and stability in the region. The news analyst goes on: Japan defiantly launched the military spy satellite despite the apprehension and warnings of the international community. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Military balance]
• Japan Says Abe, S.Korea's Roh Agree to Meet Soon
  By REUTERS Published: September 28, 2006 Filed at 3:38 a.m. ET Skip to next paragraph TOKYO (Reuters) - New Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun agreed on Thursday to meet at an early date to improve strained ties, a Japanese government spokesman said. But some analysts say the two Asian neighbors will not be able to restart their leaders' shuttle diplomacy unless Abe clearly pledges not to visit a Tokyo war shrine seen by Seoul as a symbol of Japan's past militarism. Abe and Roh's agreement came in a 15-minute telephone conversation between the two, Hiroshige Seko, Abe's special adviser in charge of public relations, told a news conference. ``I would like to thoroughly talk with the president about developing relations between Japan and South Korea in Northeast Asia and the world,'' Abe told Roh, according to Seko. ``I hope to meet you at an early date.'' ``I quite agree,'' Seko quoted Roh as telling Abe. South Korea had shunned summits with Abe's predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi -- who stepped down this week -- over his pilgrimages to Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine, which honors Japanese wartime leaders convicted as war criminals along with war dead.
• Japan's "Financial Sanctions" against DPRK Assailed
  Pyongyang, September 25 (KCNA) -- Rodong Sinmun Monday ridicules Japan's application of "financial sanctions" against the DPRK as a farce of a jester of a circus troupe. The Japanese authorities, bereft of reason, are foolishly performing short-sighted and senseless buffoonery reminding us of a rural vendor, regarding "financial sanctions" as "a panacea," says a Rodong Sinmun commentary Monday
• Iva Toguri D'Aquino, 90, Dies; Once Thought to Be 'Tokyo Rose'
  By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: September 27, 2006 Filed at 2:22 a.m. ET CHICAGO (AP) -- Iva Toguri D'Aquino, who was convicted and later pardoned of being World War II propagandist ''Tokyo Rose,'' died Tuesday of natural causes, said her nephew, William Toguri. She was 90. Tokyo Rose was the name given by soldiers to a female radio broadcaster responsible for anti-American transmissions intended to demoralize soldiers fighting in the Pacific theater. D'Aquino was the only U.S. citizen identified among the potential suspects. In 1949, she became the seventh person to be convicted of treason in American history and served six years in prison. But doubts about her possible role as Tokyo Rose later surfaced and she was pardoned by President Gerald Ford in 1977. [Human rights]
• New Premier Seeks a Japan With Muscle and a Voice
    By MARTIN FACKLER Published: September 27, 2006 TOKYO, Sept. 26 - In his first act after being installed as prime minister, Shinzo Abe, a popular nationalist who has vowed to make Japan more assertive globally, appointed a cabinet on Tuesday packed with social conservatives and foreign-policy hawks.
  Mr. Abe, 52, bowed deeply in front of lawmakers after winning 339 votes in the 476-member lower house, which selects the prime minister. Earlier in the day, Mr. Abe's predecessor and political mentor, Junichiro Koizumi, vacated the prime minister's residence in central Tokyo after nearly five and a half years. Mr. Abe had been virtually guaranteed to succeed Mr. Koizumi, 64, since winning last week's leadership election in the Liberal Democratic Party, which has governed Japan for most of the past half-century. Mr. Abe is Japan's youngest prime minister since World War II and the first to be born after the war. His ascension appears to be a changing of the guard in a country that has kept a low profile in international affairs since its defeat in 1945. He enters office riding a crest of popularity, as his message of renewed national pride has found followers amid the resurgence of Japan's long dormant economy. "Japan must be a country that shows leadership and that is respected and loved by the countries of the world," Mr. Abe said Tuesday in his first news conference as prime minister. "I want to make Japan a country that shows its identity to the world." At the same time, Mr. Abe (pronounced AH-bay) said he wanted to improve relations with South Korea and China, which soured after Mr. Koizumi paid visits to a Shinto shrine honoring Japan's war dead. Mr. Abe called on the leaders of South Korea and China to meet with him, something both countries refused to do with Mr. Koizumi. So far, Mr. Abe has been vague about whether he will visit the shrine. He told reporters that one goal of his administration was to revise Japan's pacifist Constitution, written after World War II by American occupation forces, to permit a full-fledged military. He also indicated that he favored closer military cooperation with Washington. These goals have alarmed many here who worry that any upgrading of the status of the armed forces could damage ties with Asian neighbors, which fear a revival of Japanese militarism. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Report: Japan Developing New Missile
  Monday September 25, 2006 1:31 AM TOKYO (AP) - Japan's Defense Agency plans to develop a new anti-aircraft, anti-ship missile, a newspaper reported Monday. The Defense Agency will begin three years of research starting in 2007 to develop the new missile, which will use a passive radio-wave system to detect its targets, Japan's Nihon Keizai business daily said. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Seoul Extends Abe Tentative Welcome
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter Seoul is planning to send a message to Tokyo on the ``normalization'' of South Korea-Japan relations after Shinzo Abe takes office as prime minister on Tuesday, a government official said on Sunday. Ranking officials from the two countries will also meet after the delivery of the message to talk about pending issues, possibly including ways to hold a summit, which has been shunned by Seoul since November last year, the official said. ``Seoul will deliver a message congratulating Abe on his inauguration as premier,'' the official said. ``In the message, we will raise the necessity of normalizing the frayed relations through efforts from both sides.''
• Abe's election tipped to keep Japan on even keel
  Publication Date?09/22/2006       Section?Commentary By TJ Editors
  Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe's election to the Liberal Democratic Party presidency this week--as well as his probable succession to the position of prime minister when Junichiro Koizumi steps down later this month--is being widely anticipated as business-as-usual by analysts around the world. Nevertheless, his initial pronouncements and Cabinet line-up will be studied carefully on both sides of the Pacific and by friends and critics alike. China and South Korea in particular, whose ties with Japan have recently become strained, will no doubt watch developments in terms of implications for future bilateral relations. There is no reason for the United States and other allies to worry about the direction Japan's domestic and foreign policies will take in the post-Koizumi era, however. Koizumi's selection of Abe to the post of chief cabinet secretary was a clear signal that the basic policies he had pursued over the last five years are unlikely to be changed.
  The conservative, right-leaning Abe has risen up the ranks as a supporter of Koizumi's economic reforms, closer ties with the United States, stronger national defense, more active participation in international peace-keeping roles, and friendlier cooperation with Taiwan. Both Koizumi and Abe believe that stable China-Japan relations serve the interests of both countries, but they are also unanimous in stressing that Japan must stand firm in rejecting any Chinese intimidation.
  Under Koizumi's leadership, Japan-U.S. relations have been their best since World War II. Koizumi and President George W. Bush have developed both a personal and political friendship rarely seen between the two nations' leaders. Tokyo's unwavering support of Washington's global anti-terror campaign and its dispatch of non-combatant troops to help rebuild Iraq, attest to the strength of their alliance. Agreement has also been reached on the redeployment of U.S. troops on Japanese soil in line with new military-strategic imperatives in East Asia and the Pacific. Meanwhile, Japan's relations with China have become strained on a number of fronts such as repeated Chinese protests against Koizumi's annual homage at the Yasukuni shrine, the frequent intrusion of Chinese submarines and intelligence-gathering ships into Japanese waters, disputes over exploration of gas under the East China Sea, and the intentional fanning of Chinese anti-Japan sentiment.
  Japan-Taiwan economic, tourist and cultural relations, on the other hand, have continued to grow. More significantly, Japan has moved to include Taiwan in the sphere of joint Japan-U.S. defense so as to ensure regional security and peace. Taiwan, like all Japan's friends and allies, looks forward to the developing of yet warmer ties over coming years. [Abe Shinzo] [US-Japan alliance] [Taiwan] [China confrontation]
• Comic Book Against Japanese Hatred Published
  By Bae Ji-sook Staff Reporter A Korean comic artist has published a comic book rebutting a Japanese comic that took issue with Korean pop culture. Kim Sang-mo, a renowned comic artist in Korea, recently released "Hyomillyu" (hatred toward Japanese pop culture), a book he said he designed to counter the Japanese comic, "Hyomhallyu" (hatred toward Korean pop culture)."
• Set to Lead, Japan's Next Premier Reconsiders Postwar Era
  By NORIMITSU ONISHI Published: September 21, 2006 TOKYO, Sept. 20 - After securing the Liberal Democratic Party's presidency on Wednesday, Shinzo Abe will become Japan's first prime minister born after World War II, with a clear eye toward re-examining the postwar era.
  Mr. Abe, who will turn 52 on Thursday, received two-thirds of the votes in the election for the presidency of the Liberal Democratic Party. Because of the party's grip on the lower house of Parliament, which chooses the prime minister, Mr. Abe is now assured of succeeding Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in a parliamentary session on Tuesday. In a race that was his to lose, Mr. Abe (pronounced AH-bay) avoided specific comments about how he would pursue economic changes or how he would repair Japan's strained relations with China and South Korea. Instead, he spoke of revising the United States-imposed Constitution, which forbids Japan to have a full-fledged military, passing legislation to allow Japanese troops to be deployed overseas and making it possible for Japan to exercise the right to collective self-defense with the United States. He also wants to revise the other legal document of the postwar American occupation, the Fundamental Law of Education, and emphasize moral values, patriotism and tradition in schools. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Abe victory lifts hopes for better relations
    September 21, 2006 ? Shinzo Abe, Japan's chief cabinet secretary, was elected president of the Liberal Democratic Party yesterday, making it certain that he will be Japan's next prime minister when the Diet reconvenes Tuesday. In Seoul, the election spurred additional hopes of better relations with Tokyo. Ties between the neighbors, never close, had been further strained by the visits to a controversial war memorial by the incumbent prime minister, Junichiro Koizumi. "As the new administration is launched in Japan, Seoul hopes that the two countries' conflicts will be resolved and the relationship will be developed into a future-orientated friendship," said Lee Kyu-hyung, Korea's vice foreign minister.   [Transfer] [In denial]
• Japanese Fret That Quality Is in Decline
  By MARTIN FACKLER Published: September 21, 2006 TOKYO, Sept. 20 - Perhaps only in Japan could a television series like "Project X" have become one of the most popular TV shows. No, it isn't a science fiction thriller. It's about product quality.
  More specifically, it's about a bunch of corporate engineers whose hand-held calculators and ink-jet printers helped turn this nation into an industrial powerhouse. So it is little wonder that a recent surge in recalls of defective products has set off national hand-wringing and soul-searching here, in radio talk shows, on the front pages of newspapers and in the hushed corridors of government ministries. Even in local noodle shops, the conversation turns to the bruised pride and fears that Japan may be losing its edge at a time when South Korea and China are breathing down its neck. [China competition]
• Abe Election Raises Hopes for Korea-Japan Ties
    Let the End for Koizumi Be a New Beginning
  Subtle changes were detectable in Korea's attitude to Japan after Shinzo Abe was elected leader of the island country's ruling Liberal Democratic Party on Wednesday. Abe will become Japan's new prime minister on Sept. 26. Some in the government are reportedly considering a Seoul-Tokyo summit on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in November if the new prime minister shows more sensitivity toward Korean feelings in matters like visits to the militarist Yasukuni Shrine.
  Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe bows to parliamentarians of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) after he was chosen as party president at an LDP lawmaker's meeting, at party headquarters in Tokyo on Wednesday./REUTERS
  "The attitude Abe takes to the controversial shrine for the first one or two months after taking office will play a critical role in determining the relationship between Seoul and Tokyo in the future," a government official here said. [Yasukuni] [In denial]
• Goodbye Koizumi, Hello Abe
  Bullet-Drilled Skeleton's Rattle as Japan's New Prince Hails the Rising Sun
  By CHRISTOPHER REED
  Tokyo. September 20, 2006
  No matter what the world's second economy, modern super-tech Japan, attempts these days, even when ushering in the first prime minister born after World War II, there comes an ominous rattling of old wartime bones -- in this case literally. Tokyo and the world's media are agog as a week-long process begins today in which chief cabinet secretary and heir apparent Shinzo Abe, (52 years old on Thursday) and known as The Prince, will be installed as premier. He replaces the departing and ludicrously labelled "Lionheart" Junichiro Koizumi, 64, the Elvis fan with the permed hairdo who five years ago began his term amid enthusiastic but unfulfilled acclaim. [Japanese colonialism] [Japanese remilitarisation] [Unit 371] [Yasukuni]
• Japan's Abe, Poised to Lead, Offers Nation Vision of Pride
  By Anthony Faiola Washington Post Foreign Service Tuesday, September 19, 2006; Page A01
  TOKYO -- To glimpse the brave new Japan of Shinzo Abe -- the hawkish 51-year-old poised to replace Junichiro Koizumi as prime minister next week -- take a peek inside the eighth-grade history classes at this city's prestigious Tamagawa Academy. Using new textbooks with lessons hailed by Abe as the foundation of a more confident nation, junior high students at the elite private school are this year being taught something that has been largely taboo in post-World War II Japan -- to take pride in their country. The texts omit or soften references to atrocities committed by Japanese troops during the war, assure students that the war was waged primarily in self-defense and promote the ideal of a proud and independent Japan. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Textbooks]
•   Tokyo Increases Pressure on Pyongyang  
  Turning the screws on North Korea, Japan has decided to impose financial sanctions against the reclusive Stalinist state over its missile and nuclear weapons programs. The government of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi decided on Tuesday morning to slap financial sanctions on North Korea, which include banning withdrawals and overseas remittances from bank accounts held in Japan by organizations and individuals who are suspected of links with Pyongyang's development of missiles and weapons of mass destruction. Under the new sanctions, withdrawals and overseas remittances from accounts in Japan held by certain groups and individuals must be approved by the authorities. This measure will freeze assets owned by these groups and individuals because the government will not permit such withdrawals and remittances unless they can prove that they are not involved in North Korea's development of weapons of mass destruction. [Sanctions]
• Korea-Japan sea survey scheduled next month
    September 18, 2006 ? South Korea and Japan have decided to jointly conduct a survey on radioactivity in the East Sea (Sea of Japan) in October, including waters surrounding the islets of Dokdo, Seoul's Foreign Ministry said yesterday. Japan also claims the islets, calling them Takeshima.
• Japan Shuts Off Cash Flow to N.Korea
    The Japanese government decided to ban withdrawals and overseas remittances from accounts by organizations and individuals suspected of links to North Korea and freeze North Korean assets. The sanctions could take effect this month, the Mainichi Shimbun reported Thursday.
•   U.S., Japan Ready to Tighten Screws on N. Korea
  Fresh U.S. and Japanese economic sanctions against North Korea are becoming more likely with signs that the reclusive country may be preparing for a nuclear test. A government official in Seoul said Friday the U.S. regards Pyongyang's outrage at earlier financial sanctions as feigned, implying that the freezing of the North's accounts in a Macau-based bank last September may have just been the first step. Peter Beck, a North Korea expert at the International Crisis Group in Seoul, says the next target of U.S. investigations will be North Korea's accounts in Russia. He added the Bush administration was very pleased with the results of the investigation in Asia. Beck said the U.S. chased accounts and financial transactions in Asia, then in Europe, and now for the final stage will be moving on to Russia. After having its accounts in Macau frozen, North Korea attempted to open accounts in Vietnam, Mongolia and Hong Kong but was turned down everywhere. Increasingly desperate, the Stalinist state turned to Luxemburg and Germany but was rebuffed there too. "The U.S. has the ability to put all kinds of pressure on European banks," a government official here said.
• Legal Categories, Demographic Change and Japan’s Korean Residents in the Long Twentieth Century
  By Yoshiko NOZAKI, Hiromitsu INOKUCHI and Kim Tae-young
  [Japan Focus 18 September 2006]
  Although many Japanese—right-wing nationalists and politicians in particular—hold that Japan is a nation comprised of a single racial/ethnic people, a number of significant ethnic minority groups reside within its territory (Lie 2001). Throughout the twentieth century, the largest such group has been Zainichi Koreans.[1] Classified as Japanese nationals (imperial subjects) under colonial rule, they have legally been placed in the category of foreign residents (zairyu gaikokujin) to constitute a population of Korean residents in postwar Japan. Currently, Zainichi Koreans account for approximately three quarters of all Korean residents.[2] This study examines demographic changes and identity formations among the Korean residents in general, and the Zainichi Koreans in particular, in light of changing Japanese legal approaches to nationality/citizenship.
• Names, Bones and Unpaid Wages (2): Seeking Redress for Korean Forced Labor
  By William Underwood
  (Part 2 of 2) [Japan Focus 18 September 2006] LAWSUITS AND REDRESS GROUNDWORK
  March 4, 1994, marked a rare moment in the annals of Japanese postwar responsibility when the Japanese state engaged reparations activists in direct dialogue. Parliamentary supporters of Korean forced labor redress efforts, mainly from the then-Japanese Socialist Party, arranged for a room at the Diet and officials from five government agencies took turns negotiating and responding to questions for several hours [Japanese colonialism]
• Dangerous Military Collusion between U.S. and Japan under Fire
  Pyongyang, June 13 (KCNA) -- The U.S. and Japanese reactionaries are becoming undisguised in their moves to expand their theater of operation on a global scale, while tightening their military alliance further still. Commenting on this, Rodong Sinmun in a signed article Tuesday says:  
• DPRK FM Spokesman Exposes Japan's Moves to Internationalize "Abduction Issue"
  Pyongyang, June 13 (KCNA) -- A spokesman for the DPRK Foreign Ministry issued a statement on June 13 as regards the fact that the Japanese authorities are driving the DPRK-Japan relations to the worst phase in history by persisting in their moves to internationalize the "abduction issue" already resolved between the DPRK and Japan. This year alone, in April and May, they made a big fuss, deciding to beg countries having diplomatic ties with the DPRK for official cooperation in the settlement of the issue and sending Megumi Yokota's family to the United States and south Korea for "soliciting" help. As if this is not enough, they are trying to take the issue to the UN Human Rights Council and G-8 summit, says the spokesman, and goes on: In trying to "internationalize" the "abduction issue," which had been solved, by deliberately bringing it into bold relief, the Japanese authorities seek to isolate the DPRK by taking advantage of the U.S. hostile policy toward it and craftily evade its obligation to settle their past crimes by distorting the keynote of the DPRK-Japan relations as if it is the "abduction issue."
  The DPRK sent "abductees" and their children to Japan and provided Japan with nearly 50 hours to hear testimonies from those who experienced or witnessed some "abductees" died to help it confirm their death. And the DPRK has done everything possible including the handing to Japan of even the things left behind by the deceased and their remains. In November 2004, the Japanese government, too, officially expressed thanks, manifesting its understanding of the DPRK's sincere efforts made for the settlement of the "abduction issue". [Abductees]
• Japan's Bid for Permanent Seat at UNSC Assailed
  Pyongyang, February 2 (KCNA) -- Japan is making more desperate efforts in the new year to get a permanent seat at the UN Security Council. Rodong Sinmun says this today in a signed article. It goes on: It is the ulterior intention of Japan to hold the permanent membership of the UN Security Council with the backing of the U.S., its superior. To this end Japan is busy working out a new "resolution", conducting prior diplomatic activities with the U.S. and so on.
• Rodong Sinmun Comments on Abe's "New Japan" Plan
  PYONGYANG, September 4 (KCNA) -- The plan for building "new Japan" is intended to establish constitution and state system as a war state and step up its moves for militarization and reinvasion, said Rodong Sinmun on September 4 in a signed commentary. Chief Cabinet Secretary Abe Shinzo, the diplomatic boss and different factions of other ultra-right conservative forces of Japan are making public their own commitments with the president election of the Japan Liberal Democratic Party at hand, the commentary noted, and continued as follows. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Japan’s military program in space
  [Editorial] Japan is going ahead with its moves to use outer space for military purposes. On September 11, Japan placed into orbit its third surveillance satellite, equipped with optical cameras used for military surveillance purposes. Its fourth satellite for such surveillance is planned to be fired into space early next year. The surveillance satellites will work with radar satellites. If the two sets of surveillance and radar satellites are in place, Japan would be able to scan the earth’s entire surface at least one full time per day. It is apparent that North Korea’s missile tests are behind Japan’s launches of the satellites. The U.S. had previously opposed Japan’s having its own military satellites, but now Washington is supporting the move under the name of consolidating mutual military ties between the two countries. Since it put a set of satellites - one optical and one radar - into space in March 2003, Japan is now nearing its ultimate surveillance goal with the latest successful launch. Conservatives in Japan have argued that the satellites are not intended for military purposes but for research on disaster prevention and earthquakes; in fact, they have shied away from using the term "military" in discussing the satellites’ use. However, the government has not revealed what information it has collected from the satellites currently in orbit. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Foreign policy as a ’fight’: Abe and the future of East Asian relations
  [Column] Lee Jong-won, Professor of International Relations at Rikkyo University
  "The Man Who Turned Foreign Policy Into a Fight." That is the title of a supplementary booklet published by the Japanese newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun about Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro’s approach to diplomacy during his five years in office. The Japanese title uses the word "genka." It is usually translated as "fight," but the nuance it carries is closer to a "fistfight" or "verbal scuffle" among little schoolboys. Japanese chief cabinet secretary Abe Shinzo, the man who is all but assured to be the next prime minister, is also a man who advocates that kind of approach. He has just published a book, "Becoming a Beautiful Country," about what he hopes to accomplish in office, and it begins with the words, "a politician who fights." The book is a militant declaration, in which he says Japan has too many convictionless, fight-eschewing, overly cautious politicians. Naturally, Korea has to take an interest in what exactly the "fight" Abe is talking about for the Japanese state and its people.
  So far, Abe’s comments and behavior place him squarely in the ideological and military right. He has spent most of his time calling for constitutional amendment to restore Japan’s military capabilities, rather than economic reform. He also calls for educational laws that would emphasize patriotism in schools. [China confrontation] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Tokyo aide again notes work on North sanctions
    September 16, 2006 ? TOKYO ? The heir apparent to Japan's prime minister's chair said yesterday that new financial sanctions against North Korea by Tokyo could come soon. Shinzo Abe, the chief cabinet secretary, refused to confirm other reports that such a decision could be made as early as Tuesday. But he said the government was considering its options. "Right now, the government is considering the issue in principle," he was quoted as saying by Japan's Kyodo News.
• KCNA Urges Japan to Make Public Truth behind DNA Test of Yokota Megumi's remains
  PYONGYANG, September 1 (KCNA) - A member of a South Korean organization, to the astonishment of the public within and without, recently testified that the Japanese government, when requesting Teikyo University to test the remains of Megumi Yokota, a Japanese woman abducted by agents of the DPRK in the 1970s, prearranged the branding of the remains as fake. He exposed that the Japanese government and the "Society for Relief" were abusing the "Megumi issue" for a political purpose and they even took some "defectors from North Korea" to Japan and forced them to make poorly founded testimonies, while giving money to some South Koreans concerned to make them distort the "abduction issue." As already known, the DPRK has made sincere efforts to settle the "abduction issue." [Evidence] [Japanese remilitarisation]  
• U.S. House panel hits Japan on comfort women
    September 15, 2006 ? WASHINGTON - A committee of the U.S. House of Representatives approved Wednesday the first Congressional resolution calling on the Japanese government to accept responsibility for enslaving young women during its colonial occupation of Asia and Pacific islands before and during World War II. The measure now goes to the full lower chamber
• Japan Accused of Refusing to Permit Entry of DPRK Synchronized Swimming Team into Japan
  Pyongyang, September 14 (KCNA) -- A spokesman for the Swimming Association of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea issued a statement on Sept. 13 assailing the Japanese reactionary authorities and the Ministry of Justice for refusing to permit the entry of the DPRK's synchronized swimming team into Japan to participate in the 11th FINA Synchronized Swimming World Cup 2006. The statement said: The world cup is slated to open in Yokohama of Kanagawa Prefecture in Japan on Sept. 14 under the sponsorship of the FINA. However, the above-said association received from the Japan organizing committee a note to the effect that some members of the team were not allowed to enter Japan just a few days before their expected departure for Japan. This compelled the association to cancel its plan to send the DPRK team to the event.
• Koreans Killed in Kanto Quake Mourned
  Tokyo, September 9 (KNS-KCNA) -- A mourning service was held in front of the Memorial Monument to Dead Koreans in Tokyo was held on Sept. 1, upon the lapse of 83 years since the mass killings of Koreans by Japanese at the time of the great earthquake of 1923 in Kanto district. The participants observed a moment's silent tribute to the memory of the victims. Pak Chang Gil, chairman of the Tokyo Metropolitan Headquarters of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan, in his memorial address recalled that the Japanese government let loose "vigilant corps" and rightist gangsters in brutally killing more than 6,600 Koreans in Kanto district alone. But the Japanese government, he said, has even failed to clarify the truth behind the massacre, far from apologizing and compensating for it. Now hostile feelings against the DPRK and chauvinism against the Korean nation are fostered and a gruesome atmosphere of suppression is being created in Japan that reminds us of the Kanto quake massacre of Koreans.  
• Japan's 'Peaceful' Spy Satellites
  [Analysis] Japan revs up efforts to boost its defense capabilities
      Published 2006-09-12 11:20 (KST)   Ostensibly for peaceful, non-military purposes, Japan has successfully launched its third intelligence-gathering satellite as part of recently revved-up efforts to boost its defense capabilities, either on its own or with its closest ally, the United States [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Japan pushes the boundaries of self-defense
  By Hisane Masaki bTOKYO - Ostensibly for peaceful, non-military purposes, Japan has successfully launched its third intelligence-gathering satellite as part of recently revved-up efforts to boost its defense capabilities, either on its own or with its closest ally, the United States.
  Monday's launch of the new satellite from Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima prefecture, southern Japan, came amid growing concerns about the missile and nuclear programs of neighboring North Korea, which sparked an international uproar and heightened regional tensions about two months ago by test-firing a volley of ballistic missiles. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Threat]
• Japan firmly on a conservative path
  By Hisane Masaki
  TOKYO - Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe, now widely believed to be a shoo-in to succeed Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in September, has made it clear, if ever there was any doubt, that he will pursue an ultra-conservative, nationalistic and pro-US political and foreign-policy agenda. b Abe's policy goals as the new prime minister will include, among other things, giving Japan a greater military role abroad through such means as promulgating a new constitution to replace the post-World War II pacifist constitution, strengthening a security alliance with the United States, and forging a thinly veiled alliance of Asia-Pacific democracies to counter China. [China confrontation] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Tokyo looks Down Under
  By Purnendra Jain
  ADELAIDE - During his recent visit to Tokyo, Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer raised the prospect of signing a security pact with Japan in his discussion with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and and the front-runner prime-ministerial candidate, Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe. This is a significant development in the countries' bilateral history, marking a great transformation in Australia's attitudes toward Japan. But it also points to the changing geo-economic and geopolitical regional landscapes, with China rising and India emerging and both nations' desire to adjust their foreign-policy orientations. [China confrontation] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• The Struggle for the Japanese Soul: Komori Yoshihisa, Sankei Shimbun, and the JIIA controversy
  By David McNeill
  On August 18, 2006, the entire collection of English language commentaries was abruptly pulled from the website of the Japan Institute of International Affairs (JIIA) following an attack by a columnist in the nationalist Sankei Shimbun. When the site reopened, all texts by Japanese authors had been eliminated. The controversy hinges on the fact that the Institute, whose English language website describes it as “an academically independent institution affiliated with the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs” (MOFA), also describes itself as Japan’s “foremost center for producing and disseminating ideas on international relations.” (The official, Japanese language site is silent on the subject both of “independent” and “affiliated with MOFA”.) What does the controversy reveal about contemporary Japanese and East Asian politics and international relations? The issue provoked a storm of international controversy and thus far little comment in the Japanese press and journals. Yet it reflects above all a contemporary conflict within Japanese politics over Japan’s place in Asia. [Yasukuni]
• JIIA Commentary articles
  Introduction  On August 18, 2006 the entire collection of JIIA Commentary articles were removed from the JIIA website. I have recreated the first four commentary articles here using caches of the website found on Google. Additionally, I have assembled various articles that led to the suspension of JIIA Commentary, and analysis of what this suspension means.
• Series: Is Japan Re-Entering the World of International Power Politics?
  Japanese Discovery of Democracy
  Masaru Tamamoto 26 April 2006 If civilizations tend to clash, is there among nations within the bounds of civilization a propensity toward affinity? Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso writes, "I welcome China's return to center stage-as long as China evolves into a liberal democracy. And I believe it will." (Wall Street Journal, March 13, 2006) The Chinese foreign ministry spokesman says China is intent on isolating Japan until its neighbor shows sincerity and wisdom in handling their mutual history. Democratic evolution and historical justice are generally laudable goals. Still, given the cold diplomatic relations between Japan and China at the moment, there is certain competition for moral superiority couched in terms of democracy versus historical justice.
  South Korea, which Aso heralds as one of the world's most vibrant democracies, is casting its vote on the side of historical justice. A more democratic South Korea emerging from decades of military dictatorship tends toward populism and encourages attitudes critical of Japan. Memory of the Japanese empire remains significant in the formation of both South Korean and Chinese national identities. Of late, Japan's diplomatic relations with South Korea have turned almost as cold as that with China. And arguably, a democratic China today would be markedly more anti-Japanese than the China under strict Communist Party control; much more than a tool of official manipulation, popular anti-Japanese sentiment runs deep. Irredentism-an age-old source of international conflict and fuel for nationalistic passion-over tiny islands divides Japan and South Korea, as well as Japan and China, and is making the headlines. Between Japan and South Korea, shared democratic values are not yet proving to be a source of affinity.
• Cold War Frontiers in the Asia-Pacific: the Troubling Legacy of the San Francisco Treaty [1]
  By Kimie Hara In September 1951 Japan signed a peace treaty with 48 countries in San Francisco. The post-war peace treaty, however, was far from settling outstanding issues at the end of the Pacific War or making a clean start for a “post-war” period. Rather, various aspects of the settlement were left equivocal, and continue to have significant and worrisome implications for regional international relations to this day. The territorial disposition was no exception. Close examination of the treaty reveals key links between the regional Cold War that was then unfolding and several contentious frontier problems in the contemporary Asia-Pacific. More than half a century later, the “Acheson Line” and the “Containment Line” still divide countries of the region leaving a legacy of “unresolved problems”. The global time shift to the “post-Cold War” era does not negate the significance of the Cold War origins of these problems. In fact, it is appropriate to pinpoint their common origin and consider solutions in a multilateral context.
• New Facts about US Payoff to Japan’s Biological Warfare Unit 731
  By Tsuneishi Kei-ichi
  Translated by James Orr
  [Sponsored by the Nagasaki Peace Museum last July 9, the top Japanese researcher on Japan’s wartime biological weapons (BW) program, Tsuneishi Kei-ichi, gave a public lecture in Nagasaki together with the director of China’s Unit 731 War Crimes Museum in Harbin. Tsuneishi’s talk, entitled “The Image and Reality of Unit 731,” explained the declassified American intelligence records he discovered in 2005, revealing that U.S. Occupation authorities not only granted immunity from prosecution to Japanese scientists in exchange for their unrivaled BW data, but also made direct cash payments to obtain their experimental results. (“The United States and the Japanese Mengele,” a recent Japan Focus article by Christopher Reed, reproduced the 1947 documents from GHQ’s G-2 intelligence unit.) [cbw] [Human rights]
• Seoul, Tokyo Plan Joint Survey Near Dokdo
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter Seoul's recent agreement to conduct a radioactive contamination survey with Tokyo in the waters between the two countries does not affect South Korea's sovereignty over Dokdo, an official said on Sunday. The government made the decision apparently to avoid more conflicts over the volcanic islets in the East Sea that have been claimed by Tokyo in the lead-up to Japan's leadership change later this month. But the agreement made on Friday night drew strong criticism as some considered it a step backwards from Seoul's position that it would not allow Tokyo to trespass in its territorial waters near Dokdo.
• No Response to Japan's Imperial Birth
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter Seoul decided not to send a message to Tokyo, congratulating Japan's Princess Kiko giving birth to the royal family's first male heir on Wednesday, an official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said on Thursday.
• Dokdo Winning Over Takeshima in Cyberspace
  By Kim Tae-gyu Staff Reporter
  Search Wikipedia for Takeshima and it will take you to Dokdo. An increasing number of online English-language news reports adopt Dokdo over Takeshima as name of Korean islets Japan claims as hers in a protracted diplomatic dispute. This means the ruling on the cyber court is going in Seoul's favor. As of 1:30 p.m. yesterday, a total of 165 query results were found for Dokdo on the news search service of Google, while the figure was 104 for Takeshima.
• Paving the Way for Japan's Nuclear Armament
  The former Japanese prime minister Yasuhiro Nakasone on Tuesday said Tokyo needs to consider developing nuclear weapons given its proximity to nuclear states and in case of a sea change in the U.S.-Japan Security (AMPO) Treaty. Nakasone headed a subcommittee of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party's committee to redraft the country's pacifist postwar Constitution last year. He more or less represents the position of Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe, who is all but certain to become the next prime minister and believes Article 9 of the Constitution banning offensive military action should be revised and that nuclear armament should be an option. Abe has maintained for some years that the Constitution does not stop Japan from acquiring nuclear arms, that it should acquire them, and that it is capable of making them within a week. The island country already had 43.1 tons of plutonium at the end of 2004. If a nuclear reprocessing plant in the village of Rokkasho in Aomori Prefecture goes into operation next year, it will turn out four tons of plutonium a year during the first two years and eight tons thereafter, enough to make thousands of nuclear weapons. Given the determination of Abe's faction, Japan's nuclear armament is only a matter of time. That will shake the security structure around the Korean Peninsula to the core. A nuclear-armed Japan would also upset the power balance worldwide. When a criminal country that plunged millions of Asians into catastrophe in World War II aims at becoming again a military power armed with the bomb, it means that the postwar generation is brazenly perpetuating the wrongs of their fathers. It would trample on the victims of the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is North Korea that is providing Japan with the excuse, and our government that is egging Pyongyang on. Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso, when North Korea tested its missiles in July, said Tokyo has to thank the North. It is crystal clear what Japan will do if the North conducts a nuclear test. President Roh Moo-hyun defended Pyongyang's nuclear development when he said there was "some reason" in it. It may have been some kind of joke, but Japan can use the North's nuclear program as an excuse to build the bomb. On top of it, our government is now systematically dismantling the Korea-U.S. alliance, based on which we can ask it to counter any Japanese threat to South Korea. Japan is having a high old time thanks to our administration's half-baked views on security. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Nuclearisation] [Threat]
• Japanese Reactionaries' Fiction about "Threat from North Korea" Dismissed
  Pyongyang, September 7 (KCNA) -- The Japanese reactionaries are now becoming evermore vociferous about "threat from north Korea" in a bid to use it as a good pretext for escalating their moves for reinvasion and arms buildup. Rodong Sinmun Thursday observes in a signed article in this regard: It is the avowed ambitious claim of the Japanese reactionaries that Japan should become a military power commensurate with its status as an economic power. [Threat] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Missha Loses Trademark Dispute With Japan Firm
  By Kim Tong-hyung Staff Reporter
  A Seoul court Wednesday ruled that the producer of local cosmetics brand, Missha, infringed on the trademarks of a Japanese rival and banned the company from using its distinctive and flower-shaped symbol on its products. The court decision may deal a serious blow to the Korean company, which could be forced to throw out many of its products including lipsticks, face powders, skin lotions and other make-up items. The Tokyo-based Mary Quant Cosmetics Japan last year sued ABLE C&C, which distributes Missha products, on charges that the Korean company copied the design of its flower-shaped trademark and sought 100 million won ($105,000) in damage claims. Missha's red and black trademark apparently looks similar to Mary Quant's five-petal flower symbol, although the Japanese company's design is in black and white.

 
• Rulings During Japanese Colonial Rule Published
  By Kim Rahn Staff Reporter The Supreme Court Library Friday published rulings of the highest court in 1912-1914, right after Japan colonized the Choson Kingdom in 1910. The records of 112 civil suit rulings include cases involving high-profile figures at that time, such as Japan collaborator Lee Wan-yong, Choson's reform-minded politician Park Yong-hyo, and even King Sunjong, the last Choson king. ``The rulings are significant historical material about not only the nation's judiciary but also people's lifestyle in the early 1910s,'' a staff member of the library said. At that time, when the monarchy was finished on the Korean Peninsula, a lawsuit was filed against King Sunjong, showing the nation was turning away from monarchial rule to that of a modern society based on contracts, rights and duties. According to the records, a man identified as Chong appealed to the top court in 1914 after losing suits about land ownership at lower courts against ``King Lee in Changdok Palace.'' The king who lived in the palace at that time was King Sunjong, and the use of ``King Lee'' indicates that his dignity and authority had been diminished along with the loss of sovereignty.
• Tokyo 'Hiding Knowledge of Megumi Yokota's Death'
  Choi Sung-yong, the head of Family Assembly Abducted to North Korea
      The Japanese government has confirmed that the country's most famous victim of North Korea's bizarre abduction policy, Megumi Yokota, is dead but is hiding the fact for political reasons, a Korean activist claimed Thursday. Choi Sung-yong, president of the Family Assembly Abducted to North Korea made the remark in an interview with Jiji Press. Choi quoted a Japanese government official as saying Tokyo had already made up its mind to cry foul over Yokota's remains sent from North Korea when it asked Teikyo University to conduct DNA tests on them. Choi added the move aggravated anti-North Korean sentiment in Japan to an "irreversible" point. "The Japanese officials I have met so far knew that Yokota is dead, but they can't say anything because of public sentiment," he said. Pyongyang says Yokota committed suicide in the early 90s. After North Korea handed over what it says are Yokota's remains in 2004, the Japanese government asked university and the National Research Institute of Police Science to conduct DNA tests on them. The institute failed to identify them, but Teikyo University said they were in fact the remains of several others, sparking an ongoing conflict between the two countries. "Conservatives in Japan represented by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe claim Megumi is alive, and take advantage of public support to move the country to the right," Choi said. Asked about speculation in the Japanese press that Yokota's South Korean husband Kim Yong-nam (45), who was also abducted, got involved in producing biological weapons, he said, "Both Kim and Yokota are victims of North Korea's abduction policy, but Japanese conservatives describe Kim as a cold-blooded North Korean agent and Yokota an innocent victim to galvanize conservative groups in the nation. The time has come for Yokota's family to know the truth." (englishnews@chosun.com ) [Evidence] [Abductees] [Disinformation]
• Seoul eyes Tokyo's overture warily
    August 17, 2006 ? Tokyo is attempting to calm some of the outrage stirred up in neighboring countries by the visit Tuesday of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to the controversial Yasukuni war shrine, according to a report in the Japanese media yesterday. Yomiuri Shimbun, a Tokyo daily, quoted officials at Japan's Foreign Ministry as saying they wanted to arrange meetings among the next Japanese prime minister, who will assume office in October, and the leaders of Japan and South Korea. They said those meetings might be at the summit session of Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation nations in November or at a meeting hosted by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations the following month.
• KCNA Blasts Japanese PM's Visit to "Yasukuni Shrine"
  Pyongyang August 16 (KCNA) -- Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi Tuesday visited the "Yasukuni Shrine" despite strong protest at home and abroad. His sixth visit to the shrine after his assumption of the office is a grave insult and challenge to the peoples of Asian countries that fell victim to Japan's invasion as it meant to justify the history of the aggression and crimes committed by Japan against those countries in the past and honor the departed souls of the militarists. The "Yasukuni Shrine" has served as a hotbed of aggressive nature and ultra-nationalism of Japan and a symbol of militarism.
• The Two Faces of Korea-Japan Relations
  Aug. 15 was both Korea's Independence Day and the anniversary Japan's surrender in World War II, and was met by two very different scenes in Tokyo. At night in the main theater of the Tokyo Art Center, a Japanese MC dressed in white traditional Korean hanbok appeared before a full house of some 2,000 spectators. Tetsuko Kuroyanagi is the host of the popular talk show "Tetsuko's Room" and author of the book "Totto-chan: The Little Girl at the Window", which sold a total of around 20 million copies in 35 countries.
• Koizumi's Visit to Yasukuni Marks the Final Act of Koizumi Theater
  16 August 2006 On the morning of August 15, to mark the 61st anniversary of Japan's surrender in World War II, Junichiro Koizumi prayed at the Yasukuni war shrine for the last time as Japan's prime minister. His visit fulfilled a campaign promise to visit the shrine on the anniversary (previously, he visited near the date, but never on August 15). As expected, his presence drew protests from China and South Korea. A Chinese Foreign Ministry statement said the visit "challenges international justice and tramples the conscience of mankind."
• No Summit Unless Abe Shuns Yasukuni
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter A top presidential secretary said Wednesday that it would be difficult for Seoul to hold a summit with Tokyo if the next Japanese leader continues visiting a controversial war shrine in Tokyo that honors 14 class A war criminals. The secretary's remarks are interpreted as a strong warning for Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe, who is expected to become the next prime minister next month, not to pray at the Yasukuni Shrine.  
• Koizumi ignores protests in final shrine visit
  · South Korea and China say trip damages ties · MP critical of visits has his home burned down
  Justin McCurry in Tokyo Wednesday August 16, 2006 The Guardian
  The Japanese prime minister, Junichiro Koizumi, sent his country's wartime victims a defiant valedictory message yesterday when he visited a controversial war shrine on the anniversary of Japan's defeat by the Allies. A sombre-looking Mr Koizumi arrived at Yasukuni shrine in Tokyo shortly before 8am and spent several minutes silently paying his respects to Japan's war dead in his sixth and final visit as premier. For weeks speculation had been mounting that the maverick 64-year-old, who is to quit the premiership next month, would fulfil a promise he made five years ago when he was running for the presidency of the Liberal Democratic party (LDP), to worship at Yasukuni on August 15, the most diplomatically explosive date possible.
• Koizumi spurns calls to avoid a war shrine
  Visit by Japan's leader draws neighbors' protests
  August 16, 2006 ? Honoring a five-year-old campaign promise and defying China and the Koreas, Japan's Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi paid homage to Japanese war dead yesterday morning at the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo. Mr. Koizumi had promised to visit the shrine annually, but until now had avoiding making the trip on the day of Japan's surrender in World War II, which Korea celebrates as Liberation Day. No Japanese prime minister has been to the shrine on Aug. 15 since 1985, when Yasuhiro Nakasone went there on that day.
• Coast Guard to expand for Dokdo
    August 16, 2006 ? South Korea's Coast Guard said yesterday it plans to expand its presence in the East Sea (Sea of Japan) to better protect the country's interests around the Dokdo islets and the exclusive economic zone. The plan submitted to the Ministry of Planning and Budget calls for 996 billion won ($1.03 billion) to be used by 2010 to increase the number of ships and airplanes operated by the Korean Coast Guard. The measures are primarily designed to counter the size of Japan's Coast Guard.
• Koizumi and the shrine
  [EDITORIALS] Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi pushed forward with his visit to the Yasukuni Shrine. Although he said he wished to establish a future-oriented relationship with Korea and China, he went on to take an action that offended neighboring countries. Mr. Koizumi's argument that he went to the shrine to express condolences to the fallen soldiers who died during the war and that there should not be another war has once again proved that he is a populist who glorifies wars and is not a responsible politician. The Yasukuni Shrine is filled with symbols, including memorials to Class A war criminals that glorify Japanese invasions. It would have been better if Mr. Koizumi had confessed that he was a militarist or that it was his true feeling that he regrets Japan lost the war. He insisted that his pilgrimage to the shrine is personal. But there cannot be a personal visit for a prime minister
• Japanese Reactionaries' Wild Ambition for Comeback to Korea under Fire
  Pyongyang, August 14 (KCNA) -- The Japanese government recently approved the "2006 white paper on defence". Rodong Sinmun Monday in a signed commentary carried in this regard terms the white paper a document for aggression and war as it reveals the Japanese reactionaries' invariable wild ambition to stage a comeback to Korea. The Japanese reactionaries in the "white paper" unreasonably raised a hue and cry over "threat" from the DPRK once again, the commentary says, and continues: This is aimed at securing a legal pretext for the reinvasion of Korea. [Threat]
• Atrocious Living-body Test by Japanese Imperialists
  Pyongyang, August 14 (KCNA) -- The Japanese imperialists imposed untold miseries and pains upon the Korean people committing living-body test and others for biochemical warfare in the past. They organized secret units for germ warfare including "Unit 731", "Unit 516" and "Unit Nami 8064" in the period of World War 2 and made all possible efforts to research and produce various kinds of biochemical weapons. For this purpose, they took Korean and other Asian people as the objects of murderous living body test. Unit 731 was so notorious among them. The Japanese imperialists called the objects "logs" at that time and sent hundreds of Koreans and Chinese to Unit 731 for living-body test annually in accordance with the "special supply system". [cbw][human rights]
• Tokyo historian sees tough Japan-Korea times
    August 15, 2006 ? Relations between Korea and Japan are in for a further rough patch, according to Haruki Wada, a professor emeritus of history at the University of Tokyo. He cited the upsurge in bilateral tensions and the suspension of bilateral dialogue, and predicted that Shinzo Abe, widely believed to be named Japan's prime minister next month, would tighten the screws further on North Korea. Mr. Wada, speaking to the Joong-Ang Ilbo on July 29 on Jeju, said Mr. Abe has disagreed with Junichiro Koizumi's relatively mild policies toward North Korea from the beginning. The liberal historian said, "Mr. Abe will become the next prime minister, riding the whirlwind of Japan's stern reaction toward the North's recent missile tests. Mr. Koizumi used restrained pressure on the North, but Mr. Abe will use all-out pressure. A prime minister normally compromises his position due to the political burden, but the North lifted that responsibility from him by firing the missiles."
• South Korea Denounces Koizumi's Shrine Visit
  By Ryu Jin Staff Reporter Japan's Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, left, is led by a Shinto priest as he visits Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine, Tuesday. /Reuters-Yonhap The government denounced Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi Tuesday for his visit to the Yasukuni Shrine that honors Japan's war dead including 14 Class-A war criminals. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade summoned Japanese Ambassador to South Korea Shotaro Oshima Tuesday to protest Koizumi's visit to the controversial shrine in Tokyo.
• Comfort women
  Premier meets former comfort women:Prime Minister Han Myeong-sook, left, shakes hands with former Korean comfort women, who were forced into sexual slavery during the 1910-1945 Japanese occupation, at their retirement home in Kwangju, Kyonggi Province, Monday.
• Collaborators Run Out of Options
  By Kim Tong-hyung Staff Reporter Prosecutors rejected a request by descendants of a pro-Japanese collaborator to withdraw a lawsuit against the state to return land owned by their ancestors, officials said Monday.
• NHK’s Finest Hour: Japan’s Official Record of Chinese Forced Labor
  By William Underwood
  [Japan Focus 14 August 2006]
  May 3, 1960:
  “We have heard that in March of Showa 21 [1946], the directorate of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs [MOFA] compiled such an investigative record. However, it was thought that if the documents were used for war crimes prosecutions they would cause trouble to a great many people. Therefore, all of the documents were burned and MOFA does not now possess even a portion of the documents.” [Japanese colonialism]
• The Trial of Mr. Hyde" and Victors’ Justice
  By Takeyama Michio
  [Japan Focus 14 August 2006]
  Translated and introduced by Richard Minear
  The International Military Tribunal for the Far East was the Pacific counterpart of the first Nuremberg trial. A panel of eleven judges, one each from the victor nations and from the Philippines and India (neither gained independence until after the war), heard evidence against twenty-eight Japanese prominent during the period 1928-1945, sixteen of them generals and admirals. The trial lasted two and a half years. The verdicts: seven death sentences, sixteen life sentences, and two shorter sentences. Unlike Nuremberg, the Tokyo tribunal found no defendants innocent (two defendants had died, and one—the ideologue Dr. Okawa Shumei, whom Takeyama mentions in passing—had been declared insane.)
  The trial itself, I have argued elsewhere, [1] was a farce. [Double standards]
• Assets of Japan Collaborators to Be Seized
  By Kang Shin-who Staff Reporter The government will start an investigation on Friday to confiscate assets of descendents who received financial benefits from 400 pro-Japanese activities in the early 20th century. It marks the first time in 57 years that the government has taken action against Korean citizens who cooperated with Japan, which colonized the peninsula from 1910 to 1945. A similar move was foiled in 1949 due to strong protests from the collaborators. The Committee for the Inspection of Property of Japan Collaborators will start the investigation on Aug. 18 before seizing the property obtained by collaborators during Japanese colonization. Its preliminary investigation started in April. [Japanese colonialism] {Japanese collaborators]
• The sun rises again?
  By JOHN FEFFER Progressive Media Project Posted on Wed, Aug. 02, 2006
  Japan is softening its opposition to the use of military force, and the Bush administration couldn't be happier. Sixty-one years ago this Sunday, the United States dropped an atom bomb on Hiroshima. Three days later, on Aug. 9, the United States dropped another one on Nagasaki. Ever since, the Japanese have been committed to nuclear abolition and a pacifist constitution. But North Korea's recent fireworks -- seven missiles launched on July 4 -- have illuminated a different Japan. In its desire to become a "normal" country and counter potential attacks from countries like North Korea, Japan is rapidly changing its constitution, its principles and its military capabilities. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Ban Wants Abe to Stop Visiting Yasukuni
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter
  Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday urged Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe not to visit the Yasukuni shrine that honors war criminals. Ban told Korean reporters in Tokyo that he asked for Abe's active role in improving the relations that have deteriorated due to Japan's attempts to gloss over its wartime atrocities. This was understood as an indirect request that Abe, who is expected to become the next prime minister in September, stop paying tribute to the shrine.
• Man Arrested in Japan in Korea Case
  By HANS GREIMEL The Associated Press Wednesday, August 9, 2006; 10:29 PM
  TOKYO -- A man who allegedly exported machinery to North Korea that can be used to make biological weapons was arrested Thursday amid a Japanese crackdown on trade with its communist neighbor over concerns about its nuclear program. The suspect, a former president of a trading company, is accused of illegally exporting a freeze dryer to North Korea in 2002, and was charged with not obtaining proper approval from Japan's trade ministry, said Shinji Matsuzaki, a police official in the western prefecture of Shimane, which conducted the investigation jointly with police in neighboring Yamaguchi prefecture.
  Freeze dryers quickly dry solid substances in a vacuum and are often used in making instant coffee and instant noodles. But they can also be used to dry and store bacteria while producing biological weapons, Matsuzaki said. [Sanctions] [Bizarre] [Camouflage]  
• Tokyo Residents Have Most Buying Power
  By ALEXANDER G. HIGGINS The Associated Press Wednesday, August 9, 2006; 5:19 PM
  GENEVA -- Residents of Tokyo have the highest purchasing power in the world, edging out people in Los Angeles, Sydney, London and Toronto, according to a new survey by the Swiss banking giant UBS that uses the "Big Mac" as its benchmark. Tokyo scored at the top of the survey, which aims to eliminate variables such as exchange rates, even though it is one of the most expensive cities in the world, UBS said in the "Prices and Earnings" report released Wednesday.
  "Wages only become meaningful in relation to prices _ that is, what can be bought with the money earned," it said. The bank calculated the "weighted net hourly wage in 14 professions" and divided it into the local price of "a globally available product," for which it chose McDonald's flagship hamburger. "On a global average, 35 minutes of work buys a Big Mac," it said. "But the disparities are huge: in Nairobi, 1 1/2 hours' work is needed to buy the burger with the net hourly wage there. In the U.S. cities of Los Angeles, New York, Chicago and Miami, a maximum of 13 minutes' labor is needed." In Tokyo, it takes a mere 10 minutes. Bogota, Colombia, came in last among the 70 cities surveyed at 97 minutes.
• Seoul Calls for Better Ties With Tokyo
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter
  Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday urged his Japanese counterparts to make efforts to improve bilateral ties, noting that Tokyo was the party causing relations to deteriorate by glossing over its wartime atrocities. Ban's renewed efforts to improve relations came on the occasion of the funeral of a Japanese leader, which took place at the Budokan Arena in Tokyo with the participation of around 5,000 people. He led Seoul's delegation to the funeral of former Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto, who died on July 1 of organ failure and septic shock.
• Dokdo, Shrine Visits Behind Growing Mistrust
  A poll published Monday said most Japanese and South Koreans distrust each other, due both to the visits by Japanese officials to a controversial shrine and a dispute over small islands in the East Sea. Visits to the Yasukuni Shrine in Japan are seen by Koreans as paying tribute to Japan's imperialist past, Japan's recent claims to the Dokdo Islets in the East Sea are seen by Koreans as a landgrab. Some 51 percent of Japanese said they did not trust South Korea, up 17 percentage points from last year, compared with 43 percent who trusted the neighbor. An overwhelming 89 percent of South Koreans said Japan was untrustworthy, said the poll carried out jointly between Japan's Yomiuri Shimbun daily and South Korea's Hankook Ilbo. The survey showed the deepest mistrust between the neighbors since it was first taken in 1995. The poll also showed a gap in perception over North Korea, with 87 percent of Japanese feeling endangered by the communist state's nuclear program, against 59 percent of South Koreans.
• Sea of Korea
  A 19th-century American map labeling the body of water between Korea and Japan as the "Sea of Korea." The map, unveiled by Hannam University on Monday and made in Connecticut around 1829, was a gift from the Georgia Institute of Technology./
• Selective Pain: Contemporary Japan and Media Obsession
  The Japanese media is obsessed with the kidnapping of its citizens by North Korea. David McNeill suggests other stories the media might pursue as enthusiastically.
  All the pain of the tragedy that has befallen their family is etched in the crumpled faces of Yokota Shigeru and Sakie. Most parents can only imagine the horror of losing a young child, but after years of believing their daughter Megumi was the victim of a random attack in 1977, the Yokotas learned that she had been snatched by North Korean spies. They still don’t know if she is alive or dead. The scale of their suffering is almost enough to forgive the choices they’ve made in their struggle to uncover Megumi’s fate: riding sidesaddle with neo-nationalists who care more about squaring up to Pyongyang than rescuing its victims, for instance; or seeking help from George W. Bush, whose administration is not above state-sponsored kidnappings – known these days as ‘renditions,’ not to speak of the systematic torture and killing of prisoners from Abu Ghraib to Guantanamo.
  The Yokotas are only trying to save their daughter, but what’s the media’s excuse? Day after day for five years, every tiny development in the abduction drama has been obsessively played out here in Japanese newspapers and on TV. [Abductees] [Media]
• Japan Foreign Minister’s Visit to POW Remembrance Service Backfires
  By Matsubara Hiroshi and William Underwood
  [Japan Focus 7 August 2006]
  By now it has surely dawned on Japan’s political establishment, eager for issues of Japanese war accountability to fade away, that appointing Aso Taro to the post of foreign minister last fall was a major mistake. While Aso’s provocative comments about Japanese imperialism and war conduct predated his tenure as the nation’s top diplomat, the historical record of forced labor in Japan by Asians and Allied POWs is being newly thrust into the media spotlight. Thousands of Korean labor conscripts were exploited for dangerous work in the northern Kyushu coalfields owned by Aso Mining Company between 1939 and 1945. Most Korean forced laborers never received the wages they earned; the money was deposited in the national treasury after the war and remains there today. The Aso family’s coal profits helped bankroll the rise of the dominant political figure in early postwar Japan, Yoshida Shigeru, who was prime minister when Aso Mining and scores of other Japanese corporations quietly deposited the unpaid wages of some 700,000 Korean labor conscripts. Yoshida was also Aso Taro’s grandfather. [Japanese colonialism]
• Japan Joins the Energy Race in Central Asia
  By Hisane MASAKI
  [Japan Focus 7 August 2006]
  TOKYO - Resource-poor Japan is revving up its diplomatic drive to strengthen relations with the oil- and gas-rich countries of Central Asia amid stubbornly high oil prices.
  Japan invited foreign ministers of Central Asian nations to talks early last month. And in a more significant move that highlights how passionately Japan is wooing the Central Asian nations, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi plans to visit the region in late August, becoming the first Japanese premier to do so. [China confrontation] [Energy security]
• What Price Security? Japan, Britain and the threat of terrorism
  BY Kanno Yusuke, Sasaki Manabu and Inada Shinji
  [Japan Focus 7 August 2006]
  Although Japan and Britain are both island nations, they are worlds apart--not just geographically, but in their approach to the threat of terrorism.
  Both governments became targets of al-Qaida for supporting the U.S.-led war against terror. The two countries are now tightening immigration controls in their battle against terrorism.
  While the measures being introduced are similar, the intensity of debate over related legal revisions is like oil and water. [Human rights]
• Arson Attempted at Pro-Pyongyang Group Chapter in Japan
  SEOUL (Yonhap) - An arson attack was attempted against a chapter of an association of pro-Pyongyang Korean residents in Japan earlier this week, a pro-North Korea newspaper said Saturday. In Kanakawa Prefecture, south of Tokyo, on Wednesday night, an automobile with its engine on fire was found in front of a local office of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan, said the Choson Sinbo, a pro- North Korea newspaper printed in Japan.
• A Shrine to Japan's Tainted Past
  By GARY J. BASS Published: August 5, 2006 Princeton, N.J. IF Dec. 7 is the date that Americans remember for the infamy of Pearl Harbor, then Aug. 15 is the wrenching coda remembered by Japanese: the date on which, in 1945, Japan agreed to surrender in World War II. Under Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, however, Aug. 15 has been marked not just by dignified commemoration, but by repeated international brawls over his annual visits to the tainted Yasukuni war shrine. Yasukuni is a beautiful, private Shinto monument in Tokyo to Japan's 2.5 million war dead. It also glorifies more than a thousand Japanese war criminals, most notoriously a dozen top leaders convicted as Class A war criminals by the Allied war crimes tribunal at Tokyo, including Hideki Tojo, the wartime prime minister. A rallying point for revisionists, the shrine includes a newly renovated museum that showcases a fiercely nationalist version of Japanese military history - one that glosses over Imperial Japan's invasion of Manchuria and skates past its brutal slaughter in Nanjing without mentioning the massacre of Chinese civilians. Small wonder that Japan's neighbors react with revulsion and fury when Mr. Koizumi visits the shrine. [Yasukuni]
• Foreign Minister to Visit Tokyo Next Week
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter
  Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Ban Ki-moon will visit Tokyo next week to attend the funeral of a former Japanese prime minister and discuss pending issues with his Japanese counterpart Taro Aso, including North Korea's missile and nuclear crisis. Ban's announcement came after Tokyo announced a plan to survey waters in the East Sea for possible radiation contamination. His visit to Japan is the first since late last year that took place amid rising tension between the two countries over Tokyo's claim to South Korea's easternmost islets Dokdo in the East Sea. ``I will lead the government's delegation to the funeral of former Japanese Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto on Tuesday,'' Ban told reporters on Wednesday.
• Japan's Political and Constitutional Crossroads
  John Junkerman, Gavan McCormack and David McNeill
  [Japan Focus 31 July 2006]
  Japan is at a constitutional-and political-crossroads. In the wake of dispatch of GSDF forces to Iraq and the MSDF fleet to the Persian Gulf, the pacifist constitution faces the possibility of revision for the first time since its adoption during the postwar occupation sixty years ago. Also well advanced is a parallel effort to revise the Fundamental Law of Education, which was adopted as a companion to the constitution, in an effort to enshrine the nurturing of patriotism as a goal of the educational system. Combined with the deepening integration of Japan's Self Defense Forces and the US military in an expanded conception of the alliance, these moves signal the transformation of Japan's posture on the world scene. The round table took place in mid-May at the International House in Tokyo. John Junkerman is a Tokyo-based American documentary filmmaker, whose latest film is the award-winning "Japan's Peace Constitution." Gavan McCormack, professor in the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies at the Australian National University is the author, with Glenn Hook, of Japan's Contested Constitution. David McNeill, a Japan-based correspondent, writes regularly for the London Independent and the Irish Times. He teaches a course on media and politics at Sophia University. [Japanese remilitarisation]

• Japan Hit for Preventing DPRK Delegation's Entry
  Pyongyang, July 27 (KCNA) -- The Association of Korean Victims of Forcible Drafting and their Bereaved Families issued a statement on Thursday in connection with the fact that the Japanese authorities prevented the delegation of the Korean victims of forcible drafting and their bereaved families from entering Japan to participate in a memorial service and a meeting for Korean victims of forcible drafting slated to open in Japan on July 28. The Japanese authorities talked about "inhuman action" and "sanctions" as pretexts for disallowing the visit of the delegation but they seek a sinister purpose in it, the statement says, and goes on:
• Korean, Japanese FMs in Chilly Tete-a-Tete
  Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon and his Japanese counterpart Taro Aso kept the pleasantries to a minimum before they went straight to business at a hotel in Kuala Lumpur on Thursday morning. The atmosphere was markedly different for Ban's meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing a day earlier, when the two hugged and laughed as soon as they laid eyes on each other and exchanged pleasantries, Ban thanking Li for his diplomatic leadership in efforts to ease tensions on the Korean Peninsula after the North's missile test, and Li saying how pleased he was to discuss the issue in depth over the phone. But the hour and 20 minutes Ban and Aso spent together reflected the icy relations between the two neighbors [SK-Japan relations]
• Hirohito's Ghost Japan's New Militarists
  By CHRISTOPHER REED July 27, 2006
  The world's second biggest economy is still Japan, yet for all its apparent modernity and embrace of the latest technologies, when it comes to politics the nation remains entangled in a twilight world of ghosts gone by. Its most recent example is reminiscent of a former age, centering as it does on the late Emperor Hirohito and his disastrous foreign wars; court intrigue and a faded diary; two old loyalists of the imperial past (one now dead); and instead of a fascist assassin wielding a samurai sword, a suspected right-wing nationalist hurling a petrol bomb. [Yasukuni]  
• 'US Can Preemptively Strike North Under Treaty'
  A senior Japanese legislator denied Tuesday his country can preemptively strike North Korea under its constitution but said under its defense treaty with the United States, the U.S. can consider such an option, Yonhap News Agency reported on Wednesday. Speaking at the Heritage Foundation, a Washington-based think tank, Taku Yamasaki strongly refuted claims by South Korea, including President Roh Moo-hyun, and regional neighbors that Japan is attempting to re-militarize itself by using North Korea's missile threat as an excuse. Yamasaki is former vice president of the Liberal Democratic Party and North Korea on a number of occasions as Tokyo's envoy, ``...With all due respect to President Roh, it's his overreaction,'' he said through a translator, using the same word South Korean officials have used to describe Japan's actions following Pyongyang's missile tests earlier this month. Yamasaki said Washington has an important role to play in dealing with North Korea. He urged that the U.S. ``not completely close door'' to direct talks with Pyongyang. [Sovereignty] [Japanese remilitarisation][Bilateral]
• Roh aide calls Japan's reaction to missiles 'truly evil'
    July 22, 2006 ? The Blue House chief of staff, Lee Byung-wan, slammed Japan yesterday, calling its reaction to North Korea's missile launches "truly evil." He labeled Tokyo's talk of a pre-emptive attack on the North's missile facilities as a sign of "militarism and expansionism." Appearing frustrated at Seoul's inability to shape events in the aftermath of the North's missile salvo, Mr. Lee complained that Tokyo was leading the charge to impose international sanctions on Pyongyang. "Japan brought up the talk of a pre-emptive attack, which means war on the Korean Peninsula," he said hotly; "Going with Japan means mortgaging peace on the peninsula." He added, "Seoul has the ultimate responsibility for keeping the peace."
  He recounted a comment he attributed to Taro Aso, Japan's foreign minister, to the effect that Mr. Aso was "thankful to Kim Jong-il" for launching the missiles. "Now we can understand what he meant," Mr. Lee said bitterly. [Threat] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Blackmail and Assault on Korean Students in Japan Condemned
  Tokyo, July 17 (KNS-KCNA) -- Ku Tae Sok, chairman of the Central Standing Committee of the Union of Korean Teachers and School Clerks in Japan and concurrently rector of Korean Middle and High School in Tokyo, held a press conference at the school on July 14 in connection of blackmail and assault on Korean students in Japan. In a statement issued at the press conference he recalled that blackmail telephones and e-mail saying "we will kill a student," "we will throw firebottles" and so on came to Korean schools in Japan and that a middle-aged man assaulted a second-year boy student of middle grade in Aichi Prefecture. At least 110 cases of blackmail and assaults took place in recent days, he added.
• Mindan's" Unilateral Nullification of May 17 Joint Statement under Fire
  Pyongyang, July 20 (KCNA) -- The unilateral nullification of the May 17 joint statement by the "ROK Residents Association in Japan" (Mindan) is nothing but a move to torpedo the process of reconciliation launched by the Korean community in Japan, a product of the alienation strategy of the forces opposed to the reunification of the Korean nation. Rodong Sinmun Thursday says this in a signed commentary. It goes on:
• U.S., Japan to Start Deploying Missile Interceptors
  By Anthony Faiola Washington Post Foreign Service Friday, July 21, 2006; Page A14
  TOKYO, July 20 -- The United States and Japan will begin deploying American-made anti-missile systems on Japanese soil next month amid growing concern about North Korean arms, officials announced Thursday. In addition to the deployment of the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 system -- the ballistic missile interceptors known as PAC-3 -- the Pentagon will dispatch 600 specially trained troops from Fort Bliss, Tex., to a U.S. base in southern Japan. [Missile defense] [Threat]
• Even on an Easy Day, Negotiating the Hard Line
  By Nora Boustany Friday, July 21, 2006; Page A14
  During a round of talks with North Korea over the abduction of Japanese citizens, Akitaka Saiki , a Japanese negotiator, pounded the table in frustration. The North Koreans reciprocated with the same gesture. When he threatened to leave, they told him to go right ahead. "You feel you are making a lot of progress, then not at all. Then inch by inch. They are not allowed to be flexible," Saiki, deputy chief of mission at the Japanese Embassy, said in an interview Wednesday.
  After Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi made a historic visit to Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, in 2002, Saiki became involved in the negotiations to secure the release of 16 Japanese kidnapped by North Korea . From 2002 to 2005, Saiki pondered, planned and agonized over the best approach to negotiating with his North Korean counterparts. [Negotiating style] [Abductees] [Media] [Spin]
• Sinister Intention of Japanese Militarists Uncovered
  Pyongyang, July 17 (KCNA) -- Commenting on the recent balderdash of the chief executive of Japan defending the visit to "Yasukuni Shrine", a Rodong Sinmun analyst on Monday says: It is a detonator bringing a militarist hurricane to the Japanese society. It is little short of a justification of Japan's crime-woven past history and a call for freedom of aggression.
• Modern arms give Japan a lethal edge
    July 18, 2006 ? [Second of two articles] Japan's muttering about a pre-emptive attack on North Korea in extremis may not be realistic right now, analysts in Seoul suggest, but Tokyo's restiveness with a military posture that does not match its economic clout chafes a significant number of Japanese. These analysts say, however, that Seoul should have been more alert to the many signs over the past years about Japan's attempts to increase its military prowess. Although the media and the administration here seem to treat Tokyo's response to North Korean missiles as having come out of the blue and as being itself destabilizing, these analysts agree that there is nothing surprising coming out of Tokyo. Japan, they agree, did not suddenly seize on the North's missile tests to justify its transformation. Seoul will just have to get used to it and find a better response than just complaining. "Becoming a 'normal' country cannot be achieved overnight," said Yun Duk-min, a security and international political analyst at the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security. "If we look a bit more closely, Japan's efforts have been visible since the Gulf War."   [Japanese remilitarisation] [military balance]
• Japan's assertiveness: Why is Seoul acting surprised?
    July 17, 2006 ? [First of two articles] After North Korea test-fired seven missiles on July 5, tensions in Northeast Asia rose instantly and there was universal condemnation by the Stalinist state's neighbors about Pyongyang's "provocation." Japan reacted the most sensitively, perhaps because of the reminder of the shock there in 1998 when North Korea launched a Taepodong-1 missile over Japanese heads and into the Pacific Ocean.
• Seoul Urges Tokyo to Exercise Prudence
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter
  Lee Kyu-hyung, left, vice minister of foreign affairs and trade, meets Japanese Ambassador to South Korea Shotaro Oshima to discuss a U.N. Security Council resolution concerning North Korea's recent missile tests at the ministry in Seoul, Monday. /Yonhap The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade summoned Shotaro Oshima, Japanese ambassador to South Korea, on Monday to advise prudence regarding Tokyo's move to impose a U.N. sanction on North Korea for its recent missile fires. The 15 members of the U.N. Security Council were expected to cast votes on the resolution in New York on Monday. ``Vice Foreign Minister Lee Kyu-hyung briefed the Japanese ambassador on Seoul's position, regarding the resolution that was introduced to the Security Council,'' a ministry spokesman said.
  Meanwhile, Shinzo Abe, Japan's top government spokesman, said it was regrettable that Seoul accused Tokyo on Sunday of making a ``fuss'' over North Korean missile tests. ``I feel it is regrettable that South Korea would use such an expression,'' Abe said at a press conference. ``There is no mistake that the missile launch ... is a threat to Japan and the region. It is only natural for Japan to take measures of risk management against such a threat.''
• Tough Talk From Seoul Won't Rein in Tokyo
  Remarks from Japanese Cabinet members about a possible attack on North Korea's missile launch bases expose "Japan's invasive intent, so we are certainly alarmed," Cheong Wa Dae said Tuesday. "We will respond decisively to the arrogance and recklessness of Japanese political leaders who stoke a crisis on the Korean Peninsula with reckless talk" of a military strike, "using the North's missile launchings as an excuse to justify Japan's military buildup." The government called Pyongyang's missile tests "a provocative and unwise action harming peace and stability in Northeast Asia by providing an excuse for further military buildup in the region." It appears to be concerned not because the missiles threaten our security but because they give Japan an excuse to bolster its military. North Korea's actions deserve moderate terminology like "unwise," but the Japanese reaction is robustly termed "arrogance and recklessness." [Japanese remilitarisation]
• New U.S. Guided Missile Ship Sent to Japan
    By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: July 8, 2006 Filed at 7:42 a.m. ET
  TOKYO (AP) -- A new top-of-the-line U.S. guided missile destroyer was deployed to Japan on Saturday, amid tensions over North Korea's missile tests. The USS Mustin sailed into the port of Yokosuka, home to the Navy's 7th Fleet, with a crew of 300 for permanent assignment to the region, 7th Fleet spokeswoman Hanako Tomizuka said. The Mustin, commissioned in 2003, is one of the most advanced in the fleet. Its deployment to Yokosuka was previously planned and not in response to North Korea's missile tests, Tomizuka said. [US-Japan Alliance] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• US and Japan seize on missile tests to tighten noose around North Korea
  By Peter Symonds 6 July 2006
  Use this version to print | Send this link by email | Email the author In a move that plays directly into the hands of the Bush administration, the North Korean regime test-fired seven missiles yesterday-six short-range rockets and its longer-range Taepodong-2 ballistic missile. Washington and Tokyo immediately condemned the tests and called for an emergency session of the UN Security Council, due to meet today, to impose diplomatic and economic sanctions on Pyongyang.
  For the US administration, North Korea's actions come as a political godsend, enabling it to whip up a climate of fear and deflect public attention from the deepening quagmire in Iraq and opposition to its domestic policies. As well as pressing for further punitive measures against North Korea, the Bush administration will undoubtedly use the opportunity to ratchet up the diplomatic pressure on China. Washington's objectives in North Korea are not so much economic, but strategic-to add another link in US plans to encircle rival China by establishing bases in and alliances with neighbours. In doing so, it is laying the basis for a far broader conflict. [China confrontation] [Threat]
• Battling high waves, survey ship slips into disputed ocean region
  July 06, 2006 ? ? This South Korean survey ship, the Haeyang 2000, arrived yesterday in waters claimed by both Japan and South Korea as parts of their exclusive economic zones. [YONHAP] Despite earlier statements that a maritime survey in the disputed waters near the Dokdo islets would not begin until next week, a South Korean survey ship entered waters east of the peninsula yesterday claimed by both Tokyo and Seoul as their exclusive economic zone. Despite the distraction of the North Korean missile launches, Tokyo summoned up an angry reaction and said it would resume planning a similar survey in the area. The foreign and maritime ministries in Seoul said the ship, operated by the National Oceanographic Research Institute, entered the waters near Dokdo at about 6:40 a.m., or about three hours after the first North Korean missile lifted off. A government official said the schedule had been advanced because Seoul did not want the war of nerves between Korea and Japan to be prolonged.
• N. Korea invites Japan press to abductee briefing
  North Korea has invited several Japanese journalists to Pyongyang to brief them on the controversy over Pyongyang's 1977 abduction of Japanese citizen Megumi Yokota. Asahi Shimbun, Yomiuri Shimbun, NHK and Kyodo News have confirmed the visit to Pyongyang. A few more members of the media are also likely to make the trip, reports said. Their visit is likely to take place for five days beginning today. [Yokota Megumi] [Evidence] [Disinformatiom]
• 'Comfort women' take case to court
  July 04, 2006 ? A civic group said yesterday it will take the case of South Korean women who were sexually enslaved by Japan during World War II to the Constitutional Court because their government failed to take diplomatic action to demand that Japan take responsibility. The Korean Council for Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan said it will file a petition with the Constitutional Court after holding a news conference tomorrow.
• Japanese Reporters to Visit North Korea on Abduction
  By Lee Jin-woo Staff Reporter A group of Japanese journalists are to visit North Korea from Tuesday until Saturday, following an invitation from the communist state, an official at the South Korean branch office of a Japanese daily said Monday. Pyongyang invited Japanese journalists to Pyongyang to clarify its claim over the death of an abducted Japanese citizen and improve relations between the two countries, South Korean officials said. A South Korean official said on condition of anonymity that the North offered the invitation to reporters from a few Japanese news companies to prove that Megumi Yokota, a Japanese citizen it admitted to kidnapping decades ago, died in the communist state. [Yokota Megumi] [Evidence]
• Megumi Yokota Remains 'May Have Been Mixed Up'
  Kim Young-nam, a South Korean who married the Japanese abduction victim Megumi Yokota in North Korea, was quoted Monday as admitting that his wife's cremated remains may have been mixed with those of others. Kim upset many in Japan last week by denouncing Tokyo for claiming that repatriated remains were not those of Yokota but of two other people [Yokota Megumi] [Evidence]
• Kim hints at possible mixup with Yokota's remains
  Tuesday, July 4, 2006
  SEOUL (Kyodo) The sister of Kim Young Nam, the South Korean man believed to have been abducted to North Korea nearly three decades ago, told Kyodo News on Monday that her brother said it is conceivable the remains of other people became mixed in with those of his late wife, Japanese abductee Megumi Yokota, during her cremation. Kim Young Ja spoke by telephone about remarks her brother made at their reunion in North Korea last week. Referring to a letter he sent to Yokota's parents in 2002 in which he said Yokota died in 1993, and not 1994 as later claimed, Kim Young Ja quoted her brother as saying that another person wrote the letter, which he only dictated. The letter was in the name of Kim Chol Jun, the North Korean identified as Yokota's husband, who turned out to be Kim Young Nam.
• Japan dismisses remarks on Megumi
  06/29/2006 THE ASAHI SHIMBUN Japanese on Thursday awaited new information about Megumi Yokota, the Japanese schoolgirl abducted by Pyongyang. Instead, they heard the same North Korean story spouted from the man believed to have been married to Megumi in that country, Japanese officials said. Kim Young Nam, 44, a South Korean who said he was "rescued," not abducted, by Pyongyang in 1978, told reporters in the North Korean resort of Kumgangsan that Megumi died on April 13, 1994, just as Pyongyang has repeatedly said. Kim's televised news conference was met with skepticism, even anger, in Japan. Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe expressed doubts about the validity of Kim's remarks and insisted Japan will continue to negotiate with Pyongyang based on its belief that Megumi and other Japanese abductees are still alive in North Korea.
• Seoul Wary of Japan's Maritime Survey Plan
    SEOUL (Yonhap) ? South Korea remained cautious over the weekend about Japan's reported plan to carry out a survey near Dokdo islets in the East Sea if Seoul pushes ahead with its own study there.

• Political Fences & Bad Neighbors: North Korea
  Policy Making in Japan & Implications for the United States
  by James L. Schoff June 21st, 2006
  James L. Schoff, Associate Director of Asia-Pacific Studies at the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, writes, "Japan's policy decisions ... are beyond Washington's control, but they are not beyond its influence. Particularly as Japan prepares for a leadership change this fall, now is an opportune time for U.S. policy makers to take stock of current trends and to work with their Japanese colleagues to better incorporate North Korea policy into a larger regional framework that serves our collective long-term goals."
• Film on Japan abductee seeks to raise awareness
  By Olivier Fabre Reuters Monday, June 26, 2006; 7:01 AM
  TOKYO (Reuters) - The American makers of a documentary about a Japanese girl kidnapped by North Korean agents hope that telling her story will bring her plight, and those of other abductees, to a wider audience around the world. Megumi Yokota, who disappeared on her way home from school in 1977 at the age of 13, has become the iconic face of Japanese citizens abducted by Pyongyang's agents to help train spies during the 1970s and 1980s.
  But a meeting in April between Megumi's mother, Sakie, with President Bush in Washington was barely mentioned in U.S. media, despite saturation coverage in Japan. [Abductees] [Manipulation] [Propoganda]
•     U.S.-dependent to what end?
  Monday, June 26, 2006
  By KIROKU HANAI At a Cabinet meeting May 30, the government finalized its basic policy on the realignment of U.S. forces in Japan. The action followed a final Japan-U.S. agreement May 1 on realignment aimed at strengthening deterrents and reducing Japan's burden of hosting U.S. military installations. However, the settlement leaves some important issues unresolved.
  Japanese and U.S. officials did agree that Japan will pay 60 percent of the costs of transferring some 8,000 U.S. Marine personnel from Okinawa to Guam. For the Japanese government to help pay the cost of building military facilities on U.S. territory is in itself unprecedented, and the issue is likely to stir intensive debate in the next Diet.
  The overall cost of the realignment, estimated by one U.S. official at 3 trillion yen, has shocked Japanese. The realignment push stems from a major change in U.S. global military strategies. Most Japanese are dismayed that Washington is unilaterally imposing a huge cost burden on them -- including the cost of dealing with environmental problems near U.S. military installations -- when Japan is troubled with budget deficits. [US-Japan alliance] [Tribute] [US military dominance]
• N Korea to face Japan sanctions
  The issue of missing abductees is a sensitive one in Japan Japan's parliament has passed a bill calling for economic sanctions against North Korea unless a dispute over kidnapped Japanese citizens is solved. The North Korea Human Rights Bill calls for sanctions to be imposed if no progress is made on the abduction and other human rights issues. It could be enacted by Friday, as both ruling and opposition parties back it. [Sanctions] [Abductees] [Manipulation]
• Reconciliation by Korean Residents' Groups in Japan Hits Snag
  TOKYO (Yonhap) -- Efforts to end decades-long hostility between rival groups of Korean residents in Japan appeared to bog down, as one group plunged into internal discord over the reconciliation moves. In mid-May, leaders of the pro-Seoul Korean Residents Union (Mindan) and the pro-Pyongyang General Association of Korean Residents (Chongryon) agreed to take reconciliatory steps and work together to promote their common ethnic identity. The agreement, however, prompted a backlash within Mindan as some group members said they would not comply with the accord. Dissenters in Mindan criticized their leader Ha Byung-ok for trying to reconcile with what they call "blind followers" of North Korea's communist regime without an internal consensus-making process. [Media]
• Data on War-Time Korean Victims Made Public
  A register of the deaths of 3,057 Koreans has been made public, who were victims of Japan's forced labor during its colonial rule over Korea and were forced to work in coal mines in Hokkaido and Fukuoka and died. The register has been compiled by the "Investigation Team for the Truth about Forced Labor in Japan", a private organization formed by Koreans in Japan and Japanese. [Japanese colonialism]
• Japan's Defense Agency May Get Upgrade
  By KANA INAGAKI The Associated Press Friday, June 9, 2006; 12:59 AM
  TOKYO -- Japan's Cabinet on Friday endorsed a bill to upgrade the Defense Agency to a full-fledged ministry, reflecting the military's growing role at home and abroad. The proposal is one of several government measures aimed at shedding Japan's staunch pacifism of the decades since World War II. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Koreans on Sakhalin Live Legacy of Colonial Rule
  By Kim Hyung-jin ANSAN (Yonhap) ? Cho Sang-chan, 82, feels anger whenever he recalls the harsh 60 years he endured on Russia's Far Eastern island of Sakhalin after being taken there by colonial Japanese to work as a coal miner. As part of a complex Red Cross program involving his native South Korea, Japan and Russia, Cho, along with other Koreans in Sakhalin, was allowed to return home in 2002 for permanent settlement.
  Records show Japan mobilized about 150,000 Koreans to work in coal mines, pulp mills and other military facilities in Sakhalin. [Japanese colonialism]
• Pentagon approves $458 mln missile sale to Japan
  Reuters Tuesday, June 6, 2006; 6:04 PM WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon on Tuesday said it approved a $458 million sale to Japan of nine sea-based missiles designed to shoot down ballistic missiles, a deal that would provide an initial ballistic missile defense capability for Japan. The Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said the government of Japan wants to buy nine Standard Missile-3 interceptors and make ballistic missile upgrades to one of its Aegis missile systems.
  Congress has 30 days to block the deal, but such action is rare. The DSCA said the sale would help Japan's defensive capabilities, contributing to what it called "an acceptable military balance in the area." [Proliferation] [Media] [Double standards]
• Japan's Ambition for Militarist Reinvasion under Fire
  Pyongyang, June 5 (KCNA) -- Former Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan Nobutaka Machimura from the Liberal Democratic Party spoke about the need to "eradicate the aftermath of defeat in the war from the educational field" when addressing a recent meeting of the ad hoc committee of the House of Representatives dealing with the major educational law. [Textbooks]
• After Koizumi: Japan's Future under the Next Prime Minister
  02 June 2006As Japan emerges from recession, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi is preparing to step down in September. Koizumi followed a series of weak, short-lived leaders to become Japan's longest serving prime minister. His government has presided over the economic revival of Japan's economy, although has done little to fix the budget deficit, and has also seen relations with China and South Korea plummet.
  While the course that Koizumi's successor will steer Japan seems fairly clear, who will be at the helm remains uncertain. Japan's economic recovery appears robust -- while some complications can be expected, the period of deflation is over by most measurements. Japan is also asserting itself more forcefully on the world stage as it aims to become a "normal" country with diplomatic influence to match its economic might. Koizumi's successor will likely continue his policies of strengthening Japan's military and pushing for a greater role in multilateral organizations.
  Japan, however, also remains isolated diplomatically in East Asia.
• Race to Lead Japan May Turn on Asia Ties
  By NORIMITSU ONISHI Published: June 4, 2006 TOKYO, June 3 - With Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi set to retire in September, the battle in the governing Liberal Democratic Party over who will succeed him as party leader and prime minister is well under way. So far, the race is turning into a referendum on what to do about Japan's troubled relations with its Asian neighbors, especially China.
  Japan's relations with China and South Korea have chilled, particularly in the last year, because of several disputes over history, territory and Mr. Koizumi's visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, the memorial where the country's highest-ranking war criminals are enshrined. Polls here indicate the race is now between politicians with starkly different views: Shinzo Abe, 51, the chief cabinet secretary, who has said that a Japanese prime minister should visit the Yasukuni Shrine and who has become extremely popular by being tough on North Korea and China; and Yasuo Fukuda, 69, a former chief cabinet secretary, who has criticized Mr. Koizumi's visits to the Shinto shrine and talked of rebuilding friendly ties with the rest of East Asia. Although neither has yet declared his candidacy for the September party election, Mr. Abe leads in the polls. Mr. Fukuda has narrowed the gap significantly in recent weeks, however, buttressed by what experts say is the growing public sentiment that fixing ties with China should be one of the next prime minister's top priorities. [China confrontation]
• Asos Branded as Family of Bloodsuckers
  Pyongyang, May 30 (KCNA) -- The family of Japanese Foreign Minister Aso has been known as a family of bloodsuckers for many generations as it press-ganged people of other countries into hard labor and accumulated wealth at the cost of their sweat and blood, observes Minju Joson Tuesday in a signed commentary. The Asos' history is just an epitome of the criminal history of Japan, the commentary notes, and goes on: Japan has not yet compensated its victims although half a century has passed since the end of the Second World War. The same holds true for Aso. He should have felt ashamed of the inglorious past history of his family and repented of it, though belatedly. But there is no sign of his feeling such moral responsibility. [Japanese colonialism] [War crimes]
• Satirized Anthem Spreads in Japan
  By Kim Rahn Staff Reporter Japanese protesting their national anthem are satirizing the song by secretly turning its lyrics into English words, according to a Japanese newspaper. The Sankei Shimbun reported on Monday that the satirical song has been spread as a new sabotage weapon of protest among groups that object to hanging the national flag or singing the national anthem, the Kimigayo. The English parody of the anthem, titled ``Kiss Me,'' takes the syllables of each word of the Japanese original and turns them into phonetically similar English words. Due to the phonetic similarity, it is hard to detect whether a person is singing the original Kimigayo or the parody. Many teachers and students, who think the anthem arouses nationalism and militarism, sing the latter one at school entrance or graduation ceremonies, the newspaper said. [Japanese remilitarisation]

• N. Korea abductees saga tugs Japanese heartstrings
  By Linda Sieg Reuters Tuesday, May 30, 2006; 2:09 AM
  TOKYO (Reuters) - Megumi Yokota hasn't been seen in her native Japan for nearly three decades, but nearly every Japanese knows the story of how North Korean agents kidnapped the 13-year-old girl and took her to the reclusive communist state. Yokota and other Japanese abductees have rarely been out of the news in the four years since North Korean leader Kim Jong-il admitted his agents had kidnapped them to help train spies, making their sad tale something of a national obsession.
  Now the abductees' families -- and their Japanese political supporters -- are seeking to boost international pressure on Pyongyang to come clean on their fate and send survivors home. [Abductees] [Manipulation]
• Japan approves US forces plan
  By Elaine Lies Reuters Tuesday, May 30, 2006; 12:40 AM
  TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan approved on Tuesday a final plan to tighten security ties with the United States and reorganise U.S. troops in the country, part of Washington's strategy to make its forces more flexible in the face of modern threats. Cabinet approval of the plan paves the way for streamlining the approximately 50,000 U.S. military personnel in Japan and giving Tokyo a bigger role in the key alliance, the central pillar of its post-war diplomacy. [US-Japan alliance] [Strategic flexibility] [China confrontation]
• The Retrial of the "Yokohama Incident": A Six Decade Battle for Human Dignity
  By Nishimura Hideki Translated by Aaron Skabelund
  Japan Focus 29 May 2006
  [It is well known that Japan's neighbors, especially China and South Korea, are unhappy at what they see as Japan's failure to accept responsibility, apologize and compensate victims for its wartime crimes and colonial abuses. What is less well known, however, is the Japanese state's reluctance to address the same questions of justice and human rights in the case of its own citizens who were victims of crimes committed by the prewar or wartime state. No Japanese court has ever adequately addressed the criminality of any action by the prewar or wartime state, including its armed forces. Courts have been, and continue to be, deeply reluctant to consider any possible claim of state criminality. The Japanese state, while going to great lengths to compensate, and commemorate, former "loyal" Japanese soldiers and their families, persists to this day in denying and covering up the crimes committed by that same state, including judicial frame-up, detention and torture. Some 70,000 people were arrested under Japan's prewar and wartime peace preservation laws between 1925 and 1945.
• Does Japan Have a National Strategy?
  By Richard Tanter and Honda Masaru
  Japan Focus 29 May 2006
  Anxious Nation: Japanese Perspectives on National Strategy
  By Richard Tanter
  From the centre of empire, the map of the rest of the world is largely blank, assumed either to be "just like us" and hence boring, or alternatively "not like us" and hence of marginal interest. Either way, the rest of the world is of little concern to those at the centre, at least until ugly blotches of "trouble spots" crack the surface glaze of imperial narcissism.
  Countries on the edge of empire need to know much more about geography, simply to stay out of the way. Even if, like post-war Japan and Australia, they are allied to the supreme power and face no serious external military threat, their history is surprisingly often written as a narrative of anxiety. They are worriers, those two, always looking out and up to the centre, worrying if they are doing the right thing by the centre, worrying if they are doing too much, or too little. Either way, autonomous strategic thinking is rarely in evidence. Political elites are usually highly conformist, and careers are made by connections to the relevant departments of the imperial centre. [Imperialism] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Talks between Delegates of Chongryon and Mindan Held
  Talks between delegates of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon) and the south Korean Residents Association in Japan (Mindan) took place at the Korean Hall in Tokyo on May 17. Chairman of the Chongryon Central Standing Committee So Man Sul and Head of the Mindan Central Headquarters Ha Pyong Ok made speeches at the talks. A May 17 joint statement of Chongryon and Mindan was adopted.
• Learning to Hate -- Revisited
  An American's introduction to Korean-Japanese relations
  Tony Andriotis (lefkadio) Published on 2006-05-28 10:48 (KST)
  It was June 1997. I was on my first visit to Korea and having a great time. While there, I struck up a conversation with a group of English instructors from the United Kingdom, who were teaching in Korea. Knowing that I was visiting from Japan, they steered the conversation to Korean-Japanese relations. One of the instructors matter-of-factly pointed out that his high school students were happy upon hearing of the death of over 5,000 people during the Kobe earthquake in 1995. Initially, I was shocked. Later, I rationalized that maybe, just maybe, I was being told a sensational story in order to liven up the beer-imbued conversation. After all, how could children in Korea hate to such a degree that they would get giddy at the thought of 5,000 dead Japanese.
• Joint Statement of Chongryon and Mindan Hailed in Japan
  Tokyo, May 22 (KNS-KCNA) -- At the fourth general meeting of the Tokyo District Assemblymen's Liaison Society for Promotion of Japan-Korea Friendship held in Tokyo on May 17, Seizaburo Eguchi, representative of the Liaison Society and member of the Nakano District Assembly, warmly congratulated the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon) and the south Korean Residents Association in Japan (Mindan) on their adoption of the May 17 joint statement. And he called for deepening exchanges with Koreans in Japan in the future to strengthen the movement for Japan-Korea friendship. The general meeting was also addressed by Pak Chang Gil, chairman of the Tokyo Metropolitan Headquarters of Chongryon, and other personages.
• Mindan and Chongnyon
  Two Korean Groups in Japan to Reconcile
  It is uplifting to hear that the leaders of pro-Seoul and pro-Pyongyang Korean residents in Japan got together Wednesday and agreed to end decades of confrontation between their groups. The hugging and hand-shaking between Ha Byong-ok, leader of the pro-Seoul Korean Residents Union in Japan (Mindan) and So Man-sol, chairman of the pro-Pyongyang General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongnyon) at the latter's headquarters signified the end of the division of Korean residents in Japan. The Korean residents groups have been at odds over the last 50 years, symbolizing the territorial division of their fatherland. The invisible barriers between the people of the two organizations in Japanese society were said to have been stronger than the DMZ dividing South and North Korea. The animosity was so intense that the members of the different groups were reluctant to talk to each other even when they lived in nearby neighborhoods. The ideological confrontations among the Koreans were actually nothing but a waste of energy for Japan's largest ethnic group. The division hindered their efforts to enhance their rights and interests in Japanese society. The host government exploited the division of Korean society.
• RS on Japan's Scheme to Repeal "Three Principles of Weapons Export"
  Pyongyang, May 23 (KCNA) -- Japan's scheme to soften the "three principles of weapons export" reveals its heinous intention to remove one more brake on its conversion into a military power and its nuclear armament, says Rodong Sinmun in a commentary Tuesday. Drawing attention to the fact that there are signs of maneuvers to rule out the "three principles of weapons export" in Japan these days, the analyst goes on: [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Lost in translation
  The Brits often assume that Germans have no sense of humour. In truth, writes comedian Stewart Lee, it's a language problem. The peculiarities of German sentence construction simply rule out the lazy set-ups that British comics rely on ...
  Tuesday May 23, 2006 The Guardian
  In 1873, the British scholar and traveller Professor Basil Hall Chamberlain visited Japan. He recorded his views of the nation's music in his subsequent book, Japanese Things: Being Notes On Various Subjects Connected With Japan. "Music," he wrote, "if that beautiful word must be allowed to fall so low as to denote the strummings and squealings of Orientals, is supposed to have existed in Japan since mythological times ... but (its) effect is not to soothe, but to exasperate beyond all endurance the European breast."
  Today this view seems shameful; we can see that it was not, as Chamberlain assumed, that Japan had no musical ability, but that it had no musical tradition that a Victorian professor could recognise. The Japanese musical vocabulary was simply utterly alien to him. Similarly, a commonly held contemporary British view is that the Germans have no sense of humour. But can this be possible? Can there genuinely be a nation incapable of laughter, or is it just that the German language of laughter differs so greatly from our own, that it appears non-existent?
• Latest wave of jobseekers heads to Japan
  May 22, 2006 ? At a Japanese information technology company on the outskirts of Tokyo, Kim Byeong-kuk and 19 other Koreans make up almost half of the 50 programmers in the office. The 32-year-old arrived in January as part of a growing exodus of Koreans seeking jobs in Japan because it has become difficult to find a good job in Korea. Although Mr. Kim has a master's degree in information management, he could only find management jobs at small and mid-sized companies with unsatisfying wages in Korea. [SK dilemma]
• Japan PM candidate Abe shows softer side to voters
  By George Nishiyama Reuters Monday, May 22, 2006; 2:39 AM
  SAPPORO, Japan (Reuters) - TV cameras followed Shinzo Abe's every step, and families out for a day in the park snapped his photo with mobile phones, many rushing to shake the hand of the man who now leads the race to be Japan's next prime minister. "Oh, he's so good-looking," exclaimed a young woman after she shook hands with the tall, dark-suited politician in Sapporo on Japan's northern island of Hokkaido, while others shouted, "Abe-chan," a diminutive used to show affection.
  Chief Cabinet Secretary Abe, whose post as top government spokesman usually keeps him back in Tokyo, was taking a rare if well-scripted opportunity on Sunday to show that he's more than a diplomatic hawk whom fans admire for his tough stance toward China and North Korea but who critics fear would worsen ties with Japan's Asian neighbors. Abe, 51, rose to prominence starting four years ago by taking a firm position against North Korea on the emotive issue of Japanese citizens kidnapped by Pyongyang decades ago, and has bolstered that image with an unyielding attitude toward China.
  But Abe, a political blue-blood whose grandfather was a prime minister and whose father was a foreign minister, also has a softer image as a well-dressed, well-bred member of the elite and a devoted husband -- an image that appeals to many female voters. [Japanese colonialism] [Abductees]
• No headway in talks on gas exploration
  05/18/2006 THE ASAHI SHIMBUN Making little progress in talks Thursday aimed at defusing a bilateral row over natural gas exploitation in the East China Sea, senior Japanese and Chinese officials agreed only that they will try to schedule their next meeting in June. Tokyo and Beijing have been at odds on the issue since China stepped up its seabed gas exploration near the border of what Japan considers its exclusive economic zone. Both sides support joint exploration but cannot agree which sites to develop. [China confrontation]
• Bolton says Tehran manipulating Japan
  05/19/2006 BY SHINICHI IKEDA, THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
  NEW YORK--As a major importer of Iranian oil, Japan's commitment to nuclear nonproliferation could be severely compromised, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations has warned. In an interview with The Asahi Shimbun here on Thursday, John Bolton asserted that Tehran is seeking to manipulate Japan. He also questioned Tokyo's decision to help develop Iran's huge Azadegan oil field.
• Korean groups reconcile
  EDITORIAL/ 05/20/2006 Two groups representing ethnic Koreans in Japan have consistently been at each other's throats for more than half a century since the division of the Korean Peninsula into North and South. They now say they have reconciled their differences. The leaders of the pro-Seoul Korean Residents Union in Japan (Mindan) and the pro-Pyongyang General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryun) met for the first time Wednesday and issued a joint statement pledging to turn their long-standing antagonism and confrontation into reconciliation and harmonization. These groups represent the Koreans and their descendants who were originally brought here during Japan's colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula. These people suffered many hardships, and continued to experience discrimination in the postwar era. As a community, they found themselves split by the separation of their homeland and have continued to feud over various issues ever since. In view of this twofold tragedy endured by Japan's ethnic Korean society over the decades, and the passage of six years since the first summit between the leaders of the Seoul and Pyongyang governments, we welcome the apparent thawing in the chilled ties between Mindan and Chongryun. But there are also areas of concern. For one, the reconciliation closely reflects the political circumstances in the respective homelands of the two groups, much like the pattern during their long-standing confrontation.
• North Korea may test trans-Pacific missile
  Reuters FRIDAY, MAY 19, 2006
  TOKYO North Korea may be preparing to test a long-range ballistic missile that could reach parts of the United States, Japanese media reports said Friday, but Japan's government said it did not believe that a launch was imminent. Quoting unidentified South Korean government officials, the public broadcaster NHK said satellite pictures showed that there had been signs since early this month around a site in northeastern North Korea that pointed to a possible firing in the near future. Analysts have said that development of a multiple-stage version of a ballistic missile that can take payloads deep into the continental United States is years away. [Rocketry] [Negotiating style]
• North Korea puts missile on launch site
  May 19, 2006
  SEOUL -- North Korea moved a missile to a launch site this month, but there has been no credible intelligence yet that the country is preparing to test-fire it, South Korean and Japanese officials said today. Reports that North Korea may be getting ready to test-launch a type of ballistic missile that some analysts say could reach the United States come amid moves by Washington to improve relations with the reclusive state. [Rocketry] [Negotiating style]
• Dangerous Moves to Revise Japan-U.S. Defense Cooperation Guidelines under Fire
  Pyongyang, May 12 (KCNA) -- Japan and the United States are contemplating to revise the "Japan-U.S. defense cooperation guidelines" adopted in 1997. It is said that the guidelines to be revised contain the issue of expanding tie-ups between the two countries in overseas military operations under the signboard of "peace-keeping", the development of the MD system and the collection and exchange of information materials. Rodong Sinmun Friday in a signed article terms the new guidelines a U.S.-Japan joint aggressive military action program which is drawn up to launch a worldwide "war on terrorism".
• FM Spokesman Urges Japan to Stop Suppression of Chongryon
• DPRK Urges Japanese Government to Compensate A-bomb Victims
  The Association of Korean Victims of A-bombs for Peace against Nukes held its general meeting in Pyongyang on March 30.
• Japanese and Korean parents cry over children's abductions
  May 17, 2006 ? South Korean and Japanese relatives of people kidnapped by North Korea met yesterday in Seoul to urge both their governments to step up efforts to bring about the release of the abductees. Shigeru Yokota, 73, the father of Japanese abductee Megumi Yokota, met with Choi Gye-wol, 82, the mother of South Korean abductee Kim Yong-nam, who is believed to be the husband of Ms. Yokota. Mr. Yokota also visited several civic groups' offices yesterday. He met with Ms. Choi at the office of the Abductee Family Assembly and invited her and other family members to a protest rally in Japan planned for the end of next month
• Japan's pro-Seoul, pro-Pyongyang groups seek thaw
  By George Nishiyama Reuters Wednesday, May 17, 2006; 4:00 AM
  TOKYO (Reuters) - In a move that parallels improving ties between South Korea and North Korea, groups representing pro-Seoul and pro-Pyongyang residents in Japan agreed on Wednesday to try to patch up a decades-old feud. The two groups have their roots in an organization created after World War Two by Koreans living in Japan, most of whom are descendants of those who came voluntarily or were forcibly brought to Japan during Tokyo's 1910-1945 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.
  The pro-Seoul Korean Residents Union in Japan (Mindan), founded in 1946, and the pro-Pyongyang General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon), established in 1955, have had a history of antagonism stemming from deep ideological differences. During the Cold War, Chongryon campaigned to portray the communist North as a "paradise on earth" and repatriate ethnic Koreans from Japan, a stance Mindan fiercely criticised. But in a scene reminiscent of recent reconciliatory moves between the two Koreas, the heads of the two groups shook hands and even hugged on Wednesday at their first-ever meeting.
• Report: North ships caught with fake cigarettes
  May 16, 2006 ? TOKYO ? During the last two years, Japanese maritime police officers have frequently caught foreign ships leaving North Korean ports trying to smuggle fake cigarettes, the Japanese newspaper Tokyo Shimbun reported. Citing intelligence data from satellites, the newspaper said that the fake cigarettes were at times transferred onto other ships waiting in the South Korean port of Busan or near Taiwanese waters. The foreign ships were from Cambodia, Mongolia and Taiwan.
  The top cigarette brand forged by North Korea was the American Marlboro. Japanese brands, such as Mild Seven and Seven Star, as well as British tobacco brands were also included in the list.
  The Japanese newspaper said in its report over the weekend that North Korean manufactured cigarettes use high-quality wrapping paper, while the tobacco leaves used in the forged cigarettes are inferior to the genuine products. Japanese authorities did not confiscate the goods because they were not intended to be smuggled into Japan. Nevertheless, authorities have notified foreign intelligence organizations. The Japanese Maritime Police is conducting security checks on all ships that pass through Japan's exclusive economic zone. Experts say a crackdown on forged cigarettes in China has led to an influx of machinery used for making those cigarettes into the North, which has started to manufacture them on a mass scale. Increased production of fake cigarettes by the North is said to make up for decreased profits from drug trafficking due to a crackdown by governments. Washington recently reported that the North earns more money selling fake cigarettes than it does on any of its illicit activities. by Yeh Young-june [Evidence] [Counterfeiting] [Disinformation] [Drugs] [Camouflage] [Media]
• Why move U.S. troops stationed in Japan?
  Closer ties call for joint command operations.
  May 17, 2006 ? On May 1, the defense and foreign affairs policy chiefs of the United States and Japan approved an agreement on how to carry out the realignment of the U.S. Forces in Japan, reflecting the changed security climate in Northeast Asia. The joint statement issued by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld of the United States and Japan's Minister of Foreign Affairs Taro Aso and Minister of State for Defense Fukushiro Nukaga as good as declared to the world that Japan will be the future military hub of the United States in Northeast Asia. It also showed that Washington seems to want to take its hands off the Korean Peninsula and shift its attention to Japan in order to carry out its global defense strategy in the region, with a strong focus on counterbalancing the growing military power of China, security experts said.
  In other words, Japan's armed, air and naval forces will be merged with the U.S. military in Japan and will operate together with it. "The United States appeared to select Japan as a headquarters in Northeast Asia to carry out its global strategy, based on the assessment that the risk of war on the Korean Peninsula has been reduced significantly," said Kensuke Ebata, a correspondent with the British military weekly Jane's Defense and a professor at Takushoku University. "Japan was selected because it is superior in various factors including political stability, infrastructure and financial resources."
  The United States had initially asked Japan to pay 75 percent of the cost to relocate the U.S. marines to Guam from Okinawa, but made a concession in the end by lowering Tokyo's portion of the share to 59 percent, saying it was taking the importance of the two countries' military alliance into account. [Friction] [US military] [Tribute] [Strategic flexibility]
• Korean, Japanese In-laws Tearful Over Abductees in NK
  By Seo Dong-shin Staff Reporter
  The families of a South Korean-Japanese abductee couple who allegedly married in North Korea, Tuesday appealed for progress in resolving abductee issues. Shigeru Yokota, 73, father of Megumi Yokota, a Japanese kidnap victim, and her brother Tetsuya Yokota, 37, met the mother and elder sister of Kim Young-nam, a native South Korean presumed to have been kidnapped to Pyongyang by North Korean agents in 1978, at the age of 17. Megumi Yokota was kidnapped to the North in 1977 at the age of 13.
  While the campaign to raise awareness of abductees to North Korea gains momentum, a South Korean lawmaker has raised yet another ``abduction'' issue, apparently countering Japan's growing pressure on North Korea. Rep. Kim Won-woong of the governing Uri Party delivered a letter addressed to Shigeru Yokota to the Japanese Embassy in Seoul, according to his office. In the letter, Kim expressed sympathy for Yokota's fatherly affection for his daughter's unfortunate life, but called on the Japanese government to come clean on its own past as well. ``Megumi is said to have been abducted by North Korean authorities. But she is also a victim of the Cold War era, as South and North Korea committed countless abductions each during the confrontation in the past century,'' he wrote. ``The victims of those abductions are ultimately victims of the Cold War era.'' Therefore, it is regrettable that the motherland of Shigeru and Megumi Yokota, Japan, seems to be the least cooperative country in dismantling the division of the Korean Peninsula, Kim said. Recalling millions of Koreans who were mobilized to forced labor and military service during the Japanese colonial rule of the peninsula from 1910 to 1945, Kim said Japan should not turn a blind to the criticisms that it is only making efforts for other country's human rights issues while putting its own problems on the back burner. [Double standards] [Abductees]
• Japanese Discovery of Democracy
  by Masaru Tamamoto May 16th, 2006
  Masaru Tamamoto, editor of JIIA Commentary, an information service from the Japan Institute of International Affairs, writes, "Japan is in the midst of searching for a post-economic identity in the international world, especially in Asia. The search is for a new hierarchy in which Japan can claim leadership status... Organizing the world in terms of a hierarchy of democratic evolution is another way of awarding Japan leadership status in Asia. But, in the end, the real question of Japanese national identity is whether Japan in Asia can develop a sense of equality."
• South Korea-Japan Dokdo/Takeshima Dispute: Toward Confrontation
  By Michael Weinstein
  Japan Focus 15 May 2006
  Through mid-April and into May, the already tense relations between Seoul and Tokyo moved closer to the breaking point when Japan began to implement its plan to conduct a maritime survey around the islets of Dokdo/Takeshima, which are controlled by South Korea and are claimed as sovereign territory by both
• Japanese Business Group Calls on P.M. to Halt Yasukuni Visits
  By Yomiuri Shimbun
  Japan Focus 15 May 2006
  [There are growing indications of a business and political backlash against a range of policies associated with Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro. These include mounting criticisms of economic policies leading to growing income polarization, of restrictive immigration policies that confront Japan with a declining labor force, and Koizumi's insistence on visiting Yasukuni Shrine with the inevitable poisoning of Japan-China and Japan-Korea relations. For the first time, a major business organization, the Japan Association of Corporate Executives, whose chairman Kitashiro Kakutaro is Chairman of IBM Japan, has added its voice to critics calling for a new Yasukuni policy that would contribute to strengthening relations with Japan's neighbors. The call comes at a time when rising nationalism is inflaming both Japan-China and Japan-Korea relations.]
  The Japan Association of Corporate Executives (Keizai Doyukai) urged the prime minister to cease his visits to Yasukuni Shrine and instead build a national memorial for the war dead in a set of written proposals regarding Japan-China relations released Tuesday.
• Ending Yasukuni strife
  EDITORIALS] One U.S. congressman has proposed that if Junichiro Koizumi, Japan's prime minister, who is to visit America this month, wants to deliver a speech to the U.S. Congress, he must first make it clear that he will stop visiting the Yasukuni Shrine.
  Representative Henry J. Hyde made that request in a letter he sent to Dennis Hastert, the speaker of the House of Representatives, last month. Mr. Koizumi is to deliver a speech to a joint session of the U.S. Congress when he visits the United States, probably his last before retiring as prime minister in September.
  The fact that Mr. Hyde, a prominent Republican and the person in charge of the foreign affairs committee of the House, wanted the prime minister to stop visiting the Yasukuni Shrine as a condition for addressing Congress is a serious matter.
  Mr. Hyde reportedly says that Prime Minister Koizumi shows respect to such Class A war criminals as Tojo Hideki, who ordered the Pearl Harbor attack in World War II.
• Japanese police search North Korean ship for drugs
  Reuters Friday, May 12, 2006; 3:53 AM
  TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's police and coast guard on Friday searched a North Korean freighter that they suspected was used to smuggle hundreds of kilograms of amphetamines from North Korea in 2002, a coast guard official said.
  Authorities were searching the North Korean freighter Turubong 1 at a port in Tottori prefecture in western Japan, a Coast Guard official said. The freighter is suspected of having been used to smuggle amphetamines into Japan from North Korea four years ago, he said, adding that the search was ongoing and there was still no word on the results. [Drugs] [Evidence] [Sanctions] [Camouflage]
• The Imaginary Geography of a Nation and its De-nationalized Narrative: Japan and the Korean Experience
  By Kang Sang Jung Translation by Trent Maxey
  Japan Focus 8 May 2006
  Geopolitical Vertigo and Redefining the Nation Since when have retrogressive "masturbatory views of history," represented by the "liberal view of history," come to dominate bookstore shelves? They became noticeable to the eye around the time of the Gulf War. In fact, Fujioka Nobukatsu, the leading proponent of the "liberal-view-of-history" [jiyûshugi shikan], begins both of his books-Reforming Modern History Education (1996) and A Modern History of Shame (1996)-with prologues describing the impact of the Gulf War. He observes that "many Japanese, relying on the idealism of article nine in the constitution, were able to steep themselves completely in sentimental pacifism." Furthermore, "the Gulf War was a shocking event that demonstrated that the ideal of 'pacifism' contained within article nine, and upon which 'peace education' was based, failed in the face of the reality of international politics." In short, according to Fujioka's reminiscences, the Gulf War was a sensational event that exposed the defects of Japan's "postwar democracy."
• Rodong Sinmun on Danger of U.S.-Japan Joint War Games
  Pyongyang, May 5 (KCNA) -- The Asian people should pay attention to the ill-boding military moves of the U.S. and Japan and heighten vigilance against them, warns Rodong Sinmun in an article Friday. Disclosing the serious danger of the U.S.-Japan joint war rehearsals staged in recent years in their scale, offensive nature and criminal purpose, the author of the article says: Their dangerous nature lies in that they were all drills for the use of nuclear weapons and were targeted against the Korean Peninsula.
• Japan Should Take Responsibility for Comfort Women: US Congressman
  U.S. Rep. Lane Evans (D-Illinois) has urged Japan to take responsibility for Korean women it forced into prostitution during World War II and asked others in the U.S. Congress to support a resolution to send this message. Speaking before the House Tuesday, Evans called Japan's mobilization of comfort women ``one of the most extensive cases of human trafficking in the 20th century.''
• Seoul Creates Task Force to Safeguard Dokdo Islets
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade on Wednesday launched a task force to comprehensively deal with Japan's attempts to violate South Korea's territorial sovereignty over Dokdo in the East Sea. It is a follow-up measure to President Roh Moo-hyun's special address on April 25, in which he pledged to keep the nation's easternmost islets safe from Japan's ``provocation'' at all costs. The task force, composed of around 30 officials, will be headed by Deputy Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se. In addition, Ryu Kwang-sok, former South Korean diplomatic minister to Japan, works as an advisor.
• Korean Exports to Japan Pale Against Indigenous Brands
  Citron tea is the lone Korean export to Japan that is more appealing to consumers there than the local equivalent. Otherwise, the Japanese feel they are better off buying Japanese, a survey by the Tokyo office of the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency (KOTRA) based on interviews with Japanese buyers, research institutes and experts finds. Of imports from all over the world, only MP3 players and clothes were more competitive than their Japanese equivalents, the office said Wednesday. The office produced its own competitiveness index. In the car sector, the Toyota Corolla was set at a benchmark 100, and the survey placed the Hyundai Sonata at 80-85 points and the Volkswagen Golf at 90-95 points.
• The U.S.-Japan alliance
  [EDITORIALS] On May 1 in Washington, the foreign ministers and defense ministers of the United States and Japan held a meeting of the Security Consultative Committee and confirmed a road map for the relocation of U.S. Army bases in Japan. The relocation of the U.S. bases in Japan, which is planned to be completed by 2014, will enhance the two countries' ability to conduct joint military strategies and will expand Japan's Self-Defense Forces' functions in the Asia-Pacific region. The military integration of the Japan-U.S. alliance, claimed as an Asian version of the U.S.-Great Britain alliance, is coming into reality. As United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said, Japan has established its status as the closest U.S. ally, who shares in the responsibility to guarantee safety in the world. The military cooperation between the two countries came at the same time that we are worried about Japan's strengthening its military power [US-Japan alliance] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• DPRK Hits Japan's "White Paper on Disarmament"
  Japan's "White paper on disarmament" for 2006 termed the DPRK and China "states posing threat to Japan." Rodong Sinmun on March 19 observed in a commentary that it was not hard to guess what Japan seeks in attacking others. The commentary said as follows. Japan earmarks 50 billion U.S. dollars as military expenditure every year, thus becoming the world's second largest in military spending. By spending such stupendous amount of money as military spending every year Japan has equipped its "Self-Defense Forces" with latest military hardware and ultra-modern military technology. Of late the Japan Defense Agency decided to spend billions of Yen for the purchase of computers to be provided to members of the SDF out of its 2005 budget under the pretext of taking the best measure for information handling. The Japanese reactionaries are taking an active part in the U.S. development of the missile defense system. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Spin]
• U.S.-Japan Security Alliance Enters New Level
  The U.S. and Japanese foreign and defense ministers on Monday adopted a statement on the realignment of U.S. Forces in Japan. The initiatives call for a reorganization of Camp Zama in Kanagawa Prefecture into a strategic command performing integrated army, navy and air force missions. To make that happen, the headquarters of the 1st US Army Corps now in Washington State is to be moved there by 2008 as well as a new rapid-reaction force in Japan's Ground Self-Defense Force, while Japan's Air Defense Command will decamp to Yokota Air Base in Tokyo by 2010. [US-Japan Alliance] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• US, Japan agree overhaul of security ties
  By Paul Eckert, Asia Correspondent Reuters Monday, May 1, 2006; 4:42 PM
  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States and Japan agreed on Monday to bolster their military alliance and made final a comprehensive plan to streamline U.S. forces in Japan while improving missile defense and intelligence-sharing. Top U.S. and Japanese defense officials and diplomats also pledged to work together to halt the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea and voiced a shared concern about a lack of transparency in China's military buildup.
  "The ministers stressed the imperative of strengthening and improving the effectiveness of bilateral security and defense cooperation in such areas as ballistic missile defense, bilateral contingency planning, information sharing and intelligence cooperation," said in a joint statement. [US-Japan alliance] [China confrontation] [Threat] [Imperialism] [[Japanese remilitarisation]
• Family Skeletons: Japan's Foreign Minister and Forced Labor by Koreans and Allied POWs
  By Christopher Reed
  Japan Focus 1 May 2006
  [Aso Mining Company had been producing coal to fuel Japan's modernization for nearly 70 years by the time Aso Taro, Japan's current foreign minister, was born in 1940. Faced with a severe heavy labor shortage as the China war gave way to the Pacific War, Japanese industry increasingly turned to Korean, Allied POW and Chinese forced labor. Some 10,000 Korean forced laborers toiled under miserable conditions for Aso Mining. In addition, it is now emerging that 300 Allied prisoners of war performed forced labor at Fukuoka POW Branch Camp No. 26, better known as the Aso Yoshikuma coal mine. Two-thirds of the prisoners were Australian; one-third was British; two were Dutch. None of these 300 men, or the 10,000 Korean labor conscripts, ever received payment for their work or an apology or any compensation from Aso Mining or its successor companies, nor from the Japanese government or its sitting foreign minister. [Abductees] [Japanese colonialism]
• Japan to Pay $6 Billion to Move US Marines to Guam
  By Asahi Shimbun
  Japan Focus 1 May 2006 [In an unprecedented move, Japan has agreed to pay $6.1 billion to relocate 8,000 US Marines from Okinawa to Guam. As the Asahi and Yomiuri reports show, many important questions remain unanswered. They include: why is Japan paying to establish US bases thousands of miles away? Does this mean that Japan's, and above all Okinawa's faithful service in providing a launch pad for US forces in Korea, Vietnam, in Iraq and elsewhere were inadequate? Or is this more in the nature of the kind of payoff required to encourage an unwelcome visitor to leave one's neighborhood? Why did Japan finally accept the inflated US estimates of the costs of such a move and double the share it agreed to pay? And what will be the costs for Japan of the other side of the agreement, the construction of a heliport at Heneko and troop transfers at Iwakuni and elsewhere, moves bitterly fought by local citizens? The Yomiuri speaks of costs in the range of two trillion yen, dwarfing the costs of the Guam move. [Tribute] [US military]
• Foreign Minister Pledges to Safeguard Dokdo
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter Seoul is mapping out a strategy to help raise international recognition that South Korea has territorial sovereignty over Dokdo, while not giving the impression the islets are under a territorial dispute, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Ban Ki-moon said on Monday. Attending a KBS talk show, he said the government has thoroughly reviewed international laws and related documents over the past decades to deter Japan's attempts to violate South Korea's territorial rights. Ban said Seoul and Tokyo plan resuming talks this month on demarcation of the exclusive economic zone (EEZ). He also reconfirmed Seoul will register the Korean names of undersea features in the East Sea with an international organization ``at an appropriate time'' because it is a state's ``inalienable'' right.

• Japanese abductee still alive, her mother says
  April 29, 2006 ? WASHINGTON ? Shedding tears, Sakie Yokota, 70, mother of Japanese abductee Megumi Yokota, told a panel of American lawmakers on Thursday that her daughter is still alive in North Korea. Pyongyang has said Ms. Yokota committed suicide in 1994. But Sakie Yokota appeared at a hearing of a panel at the U.S. House of Representatives and pleaded for action to bring her daughter back home.
• Japanese Senior Diplomat's Outcries under Fire
  Pyongyang, April 26 (KCNA) -- The director for Asian-Oceanic Affairs of the Japanese Foreign Ministry who is chief delegate of the Japanese side to the six-party talks recently pulled up the DPRK, blustering that north Korea should unconditionally and promptly return to the six-party talks. Rodong Sinmun Wednesday observes in a signed commentary in this regard: Such remarks can be made only by those busy toeing the U.S. line. Japan should have properly advised the U.S. as a party concerned with the six-party talks. Yet, it is kicking up the racket of sanctions, pursuant to the U.S. hostile policy toward the DPRK. This behavior is throwing more difficulties and hurdles in the way of the talks. The commentary goes on: Japan is not in a position to talk about the DPRK's unconditional return to the six-party talks. It is well known that Japan has long actively supported and cooperated with the U.S. in its hostile policy toward the DPRK with bitterness toward it. The Japanese reactionaries are busy echoing the U.S. groundless accusations against the DPRK. They have blindly defended and supported their American master when he took the measure to apply sanctions against the DPRK. It is the height of folly for such philistines to talk about someone's unconditional return to the six-party talks. This is a revelation of the bad habit of those who are hell-bent on serving the U.S. No matter how vociferously they may call for the DPRK's return to the six-party talks, while tightening sanctions against it, no one will lend an ear to it. The Japanese ultra-right conservatives' evermore frantic anti-DPRK racket pursuant to the U.S. policy would bring them nothing good. [Bluster]
• Japan's Vice Minister Will Visit Seoul Amid Dokdo Row
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter Japan's Senior Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs Yasuhisa Shiozaki will visit Seoul on May 1 amid rising diplomatic tensions over Dokdo, diplomatic sources in Seoul and Tokyo confirmed on Thursday.
• Japanese Mother Tells Congress of Anguish
  By FOSTER KLUG The Associated Press Thursday, April 27, 2006; 2:47 PM
  WASHINGTON -- The mother of a girl who has become the symbol of anger over Japanese citizens kidnapped by North Korea told Congress Thursday that time is running out to save her daughter and other victims she believes are still alive. In sometimes tearful testimony, Sakie Yokota, whose daughter Megumi was 13 when she was kidnapped on her way home from school in 1977, spoke of the profound pain, fatigue and helplessness she has felt trying to find her daughter.
  Yokota, who was scheduled to meet with President Bush on Friday, urged the world to impose sanctions on North Korea if the victims are not returned immediately. "My daughter Megumi and other abductees must be alive somewhere in North Korea," Yokota said through a translator. "They are waiting for our help, even now."
• N Korea asked to extradite 'spy'
  By Chris Hogg BBC News, Tokyo Japan has asked North Korea to hand over a man they believe helped to abduct a Japanese man 26 years ago. Sing Guang-su, 76, is already wanted by Tokyo for his alleged part in the kidnap of four other Japanese citizens. Japan made the request through diplomatic channels in Beijing as Japan and North Korea do not have diplomatic relations
  Mr Sing is already on an Interpol wanted list. He is alleged to have kidnapped four other Japanese citizens. So this latest move is largely symbolic. Posting additional charges relating to the abduction of Mr Hara appears to be part of Japan's efforts to step up the pressure on North Korea. [Pressure] [Camouflage]
• Japanese media unite vs. Korea
  April 27, 2006 ? Even Japanese media usually sympathetic to Korea joined an avalanche of criticism of President Roh Moo-hyun yesterday after his televised tirade against Japan's claims to the Dokdo islets, known as Takeshima in Japan. Asahi Shimbun, which is generally liberal in its editorial outlook, said that President Roh was evidently unable to control his rage, interpreting the speech as a signal that there could be no improvement in bilateral relations between Korea and Japan for the rest of his term. The newspaper said that if territorial issues were thrust to the forefront of bilateral relations, the two nations would face a dilemma in addressing other issues. [Media]
• Seoul Declares Tougher Diplomatic War
  By Ryu Jin Staff Reporter Seoul and Tokyo are likely to find themselves in a tougher diplomatic war in the coming days as South Korea decides to drop its ``silent diplomacy'' and take a more proactive approach to pending bilateral issues, such as the Dokdo problem.
• Dokdo Symbol of Korea's Restored Independence
  following is the full text of President Roh Moo-hyun's special statement on the recent relations between South Korea and Japan. The English-version statement was provided by the presidential office. _ ED
• Sex Slave Victims Bare Their Shame at 'Sharing House'
  By Tim Murray Contributing Writer
  A statue on the grounds of 'Sharing House' depicts the plight of comfort women forced into sexual slavery during World War II. Nine former comfort women now live at 'Sharing House,' which hosted a group of foreign and Korean visitors Sunday. /Photo by Tim Murray With rising tension between Japan and South Korea last week over Dokdo island, public attention is shifting once again to the seemingly endless historical conflict in North East Asia and issues of Japanese colonialism and war crimes. But how many people have ever heard the stories of the victims of this history fist hand? Last Sunday a group of about 20 foreigners and Koreans toured the `Sharing House' Kwangju, Kyungki-do, to do just that, to learn more about that history in a museum and listen to testimony from a halmonis (Korean for grandmother) translated into English.
• North Korean Ferry Enters Northern Japan
  By MARI YAMAGUCHI TOKYO (AP) - A North Korean ferry entered a port in northern Japan for the first time in more than six months amid tight security Tuesday as protesters demanded the release of Japanese abductees they believe are held by the communist country. The Mangyongbong-92 was inspected by Japanese authorities as nearly 500 police guarded the area. Officials found six minor problems with the vessel, including ones related to fire prevention and communications, but issued no corrective orders, according to the Transport Ministry. [Sanctions]
• Minju Joson Calls for Defending Tok Islet
  Pyongyang, April 23 (KCNA) -- The DPRK will never turn its face away from the present situation in which the Korean nation is facing a highest task to defend Tok Islet. Minju Joson Sunday says this in a signed commentary. Recalling that Japan is seeking maritime survey in the economic waters around the islet, the commentary brands it as a grave infringement upon and violent challenge to the sovereignty, dignity and interests of the Korean nation.
• Roh Vows to Protect Dokdo
  By Ryu Jin Staff Reporter President Roh Moo-hyun vowed Tuesday South Korea would strongly defend Dokdo against Japanese claims, defining Tokyo's repeated provocation as an ``act of negating the complete liberation and independence'' of the country from its former colonial ruler. In a special statement at Chong Wa Dae, he stressed South Korea would undertake all possible measures to protect Dokdo, the country's easternmost islets, whatever the costs and sacrifices may be because it is a matter of no compromise or surrender.
• Dokdo Symbol of Korea's Sovereignty Restoration
  following is the full text of President Roh Moo-hyun's special statement on the recent relations between South Korea and Japan. The English-version statement was provided by the presidential office. _ ED My fellow Koreans, Dokdo is our land. It is not only part of our territory but also our own soil of historic significance where 40 years of painful history is engraved vividly. Dokdo is our territory that was first to be annexed to Japan in the course of its usurpation of the Korean Peninsula. The Russo-Japanese War was a war of aggression that Imperial Japan initiated to secure control over the Korean Peninsula.
• EEZ Will Include Dokdo
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Ban Ki-moon said on Tuesday Seoul will ``definitely'' include Dokdo within the boundary of South Korea's economic waters by thoroughly preparing for negotiations with Tokyo next month on the demarcation of the exclusive economic zone (EEZ).
• Uneasy truce is struck over disputed islands
  Korea 'postpones' name bid; Japan recalls ships
  April 24, 2006 ? The deterioration of bilateral ties between South Korea and Japan has been put on hold, at least temporarily. After two days of tense diplomatic negotiations, Seoul and Tokyo managed over the weekend to steer away from more confrontation; Japan halted its efforts to conduct a maritime exploration in the contested sea area, and South Korea postponed its bid to assign a new international name to a seabed feature in the area. Both sides also agreed to begin negotiations next month on delimiting exclusive economic zone boundaries that have been unclear for years. Four earlier rounds of talks on that subject have been unsuccessful. The two Japanese vessels that were awaiting a "go" signal just outside a port in southwestern Japan headed back to Tokyo yesterday. The ships were scheduled to explore the seabed near the Dokdo islets, known as Takeshima in Japan, a voyage apparently designed as a counter to Seoul's efforts to strip a Japanese name from a sea valley in the area. On Saturday, negotiations between Vice Foreign Minister Shotaro Yachi of Japan and his Korean counterpart, Yu Myung-hwan, seemed to have failed. Officials here hinted to reporters that no agreement was likely. But on Saturday evening, the two sides finally found what appeared to be the obvious compromise; no voyage, no new name.
• 'The Law of next year' in Japanese politics
  By Wakamiya Yoshibumi
  [The chief of the Asahi shimbun's editorial board here draws attention to the cycle of reconciliation/repudiation, apology/assertion in Japan's attitudes towards Asia. He dubs this the "Law of Next Year," meaning that the one is inevitably followed by the other. Wakamiya's brief survey through the administrations of Sato and Fukuda in the 1970s, Nakasone in the 1980s, Obuchi in the 1990s and Koizumi in the 2000s is instructive, but it raises more questions than it answers. For one thing, the "apologies" scarcely deserve to be known by that term. The carefully calibrated expressions of regret have repeatedly failed the basic test of sincerity not only because they are bureaucratic formulations intended to deny responsibility as much as concede it, but because they lack the natural accompaniment of apology - restitution, for example payment to victims of atrocities and human rights violations. [Softpower] [Japanese colonialism]
• Seoul Regrets Shimane's Dokdo Day Event
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter The government on Wednesday expressed ``strong'' regrets over a western Japanese prefecture's hosting of a ceremony, marking Japan's claim of sovereignty over the Dokdo islets, which have been under the administration of South Korea. But high-ranking officials in Seoul refrained from publicly criticizing the Japanese government, rather just confirming the official stance of Seoul over the issue.
• Japan Denounced for Claims to Dokdo Islets
  By Kim Tong-hyung Staff Reporter Hundreds of people rallied in front of the Japanese Embassy in downtown Seoul Tuesday, denouncing Japanese claims to Dokdo. Dokdo, a rocky set of islets off Korea's eastern coast, became a subject of political tension between Korea and Japan after the Shimane prefecture on Japan's west coast last year passed on ordinance to designate Feb. 22 as ``Takeshima Day'' to mark its claim over the islets currently controlled by Korea.
• Japan's Ambition to Grab Tok Islet Denounced
  Pyongyang, April 3 (KCNA) -- The south Korean political circle is rejecting the Japanese government's ambition to grab Tok Islet, according to radio reports from south Korea. Ruling and opposition parties including the Uri Party charged that the action taken by the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology to allow the description of Tok Islet as part of the Japanese territory in history and geography textbooks for high school students is a serious diplomatic provocation to the Koreans and an encroachment upon their spirit
• Rodong Sinmun on Japan's Abduction of DPRK Citizens
  Pyongyang, April 1 (KCNA) -- The Japanese authorities are obliged to immediately call to question the abduction of DPRK citizens by those of its NGO in DPRK-China border areas and take a relevant measure. But rather they are asserting that the case has nothing to do with the Japanese government and spreading a wrong public opinion the DPRK, a victim, is at issue. Rodong Sinmun says this in a commentary today. Their assertion stems from the trick peculiar to ill-natured and brazenfaced Japan, the commentary points out, and goes on: The abduction of DPRK citizens by those of Japan's NGO is irrefutably a blatant violation of human rights and a crime against humanity. The abductors must be directed and paid by a plot-breeding agency of the Japanese government to do such wrongs.
• Japan Knows It Can Provoke Us With Impunity
  The Japanese government has given instructions that sentences like, "Japan has a dispute with Korea over Takeshima" -- the Japanese name for Korea's Dokdo islets -- in high-school textbooks for use next year must be changed to, "Korea claims ownership over Takeshima," thus turning the truth on its head. The instructions say it must be made explicit that the islets are properly Japanese territory." When Korea and China confronted Japan over the habitual historical and political distortions in its textbooks, Tokyo until a few years ago said it could do little to interfere with textbooks, which are approved but not published by the state. There was at least a pretense of holding individual publishers responsible to that. Now Tokyo nakedly wrests the discretion from private publishers and bullies them into printing the government propaganda.
• Japan Calls China a Military Threat
  By HIROKO TABUCHI The Associated Press Saturday, April 1, 2006; 10:53 PM
  TOKYO -- Two top Japanese officials called China a military threat on Sunday and rebuffed conciliatory gestures by Beijing over a disputed war shrine, in comments likely to heighten tensions between the two nations. Foreign Minister Taro Aso _ who has already angered China in recent months with a series of critical comments _ questioned China's rapid military spending increases and its lack of transparency.
  "It's not clear what China is using the money for. This creates a sense of threat for surrounding countries," he said on a Fuji TV Network talk show, in an unusually clear expression of Japanese government unease. China has announced double-digit spending increases for its 2.5-million-member military nearly every year since the early 1990s [Spin] [China confrontation]
• Seoul Protests Japan's Dokdo Claim
  By Ryu Jin Staff Reporter South Korea Thursday strongly protested Japan's recent efforts to step up its claim to Dokdo, a group of rocky islets in the East Sea, through an explicit distortion of textbooks.

• Tokyo Directs Publishers to Cite Dokdo as Japanese Territory
  The Japanese government has openly instructed publishers of high school history textbooks to describe Dokdo, South Korea's easternmost islets, as a territory of Japan. Japan's move is expected to exacerbate its already-chilled relations with South Korea. The controversial move was revealed Wednesday when the Japanese education ministry released the results of its review on new high school textbooks that will be introduced next year. [Textbooks]
• Tokyo Directs High School Textbooks to Modify Historical Issues
  It seems that Japan is set to create another stir in on-going disputes with its neighboring countries like South Korea and China over a handful of historic and territorial issues. Following the education ministry's annual review of new high school textbooks many of them have ended up reflecting the government's views. Japan's education ministry has approved all 306 textbooks, to be used by first-year high school students from next spring. In the latest screening of history, geography and civics textbooks, the Japanese government has reportedly asked private publishers to revise the majority of references made to controversial issues involving Japan and its neighboring countries. On the East Sea islets controlled by Korea, called Dokdo in Korea and Takeshima in Japan, one draft textbook initially said its sovereignty was in negotiation with Korea. But the passage was changed at the ministry's request to read the territory belongs to Japan's Shimane Prefecture and that Korea also claims it.
• Japan Government Urged to Extradite Those Wanted to DPRK
  Pyongyang, March 27 (KCNA) -- A spokesman for the DPRK Ministry of People's Security Monday answered a question raised by the KCNA as regards the issue of warrants for the arrest of those who were involved in the abduction of DPRK citizens. The spokesman said: Under the manipulation of U.S. and Japanese intelligence and plot-breeding bodies and right-wing conservative forces, anti-DPRK organizations and individuals abducted our citizens in broad daylight in the guise of a "non-governmental organization" under the pretext of "humanitarianism". We regard this as a grave infringement upon our national sovereignty and safety of citizens, part of the plot to overturn our system. Accordingly, the ministry issued warrants of arrest for members of a Japanese "non-governmental organization" such as Fumiaki Yamata, Hiroshi Kato, Takayuki Noguchi and Ri Yong Hwa as the first step according to the relevant articles of the DPRK criminal law and the criminal procedure law. They wire-pulled behind the scenes the operations of luring and abducting citizens of the DPRK including those who returned to their homeland from Japan and their children and Japanese women in the DPRK or were directly involved in them. The ministry will take necessary steps for this in the areas where the DPRK's sovereignty is exercised and where cooperation in this respect is possible, demanding through a diplomatic channel the Japanese government extradite the above-said criminals, the spokesman stressed.
• Japan's Indian Ocean Naval Deployment: Blue water militarization in a "normal country"
  [Japan Focus 27 March 2006]
  By Richard Tanter [ By most standards, Japan is now the world's number two naval power. This article, and the accompanying Asahi Shimbun series on Japan's four year Maritime Self Defense Force deployment to the Indian Ocean, reveals how far Japan's military reach now extends within the framework of US-Japan alliance. See the five-part Asahi Shinbun report, ?apan? New Blue Water Navy: A Four-Year Indian Ocean Mission Recasts the Constitution and the US-Japan Alliance·] Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force destroyers and refuelling supply ships have been continually on-station in the Indian Ocean since November 2001. The MSDF ships were dispatched under the Anti-Terrorism Special Measures Law (2001), which has since been extended a number of times beyond its original two year period of application. [1] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Japan's New Blue Water Navy: A Four-year Indian Ocean mission recasts the Constitution and the US-Japan alliance
  [Japan Focus 27 March 2006]
  By the Asahi Shinbun Translation by Eriko Osaki and Michael Penn
  [This is the second of a two part series on the strategic and constitutional implications of Japan's expansive naval role in the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf. See Richard Tanter's "Japan's Indian Ocean Naval Deployment: Blue water militarization in a "normal country".] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• The Iwakuni Referendum and the Future of the U.S. Military Base Realignment Agreement
  [Japan Focus 27 March 2006]
  By Eric Johnston
  When U.S. President George W. Bush and Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro took a friendly stroll through the quiet grounds of Kyoto's Imperial Palace last November, it was easy to assume that things just couldn't have been better between the two countries. Yes, there was the issue of U.S. beef, which Japan had banned in 2003 after mad-cow disease was discovered in U.S. cattle. But bilateral trade issues have always taken a back seat to the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty, and it was clear Bush and Koizumi were in Kyoto to celebrate an agreement, signed in October, that would be the first major realignment of U.S. forces in Japan since the end of the Cold War.
• US Asks Japan to Stop Iran Oil Development: Sankei Shinbun
  [Japan Focus 27 March 2006]
  By Elaine Lies
  TOKYO (Reuters) - The United States has informally asked Japan to suspend its plans to develop an Iranian oil field as part of world efforts to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, a Japanese newspaper said on Thursday. Resource-poor Japan has been planning to develop Iran's Azadegan oil field, estimated to hold the world's second-biggest single oil reserve, despite objections from Washington.
• DPRK-Japan Inter-Governmental Talks Held
  Photo shows a general session on February 4, the first day of the inter-governmental talks between the DPRK and Japan in Beijing. The DPRK-Japan inter-governmental talks for the normalization of their relations took place in Beijing from February 4 to 8, 2006. The talks discussed the issue of Japan's redemption of its past and security and abduction issues to implement the DPRK-Japan Pyongyang Declaration adopted on September 17, 2002 and other issues of mutual concern. On the issue of Japan's redemption of its past, the DPRK side clarified its stand that Japan should conduct economic cooperation with the DPRK as stipulated in the declaration, to begin with, and that it should pay for the hideous crimes perpetrated against humanity such as forcible drafting of more than 8.4 million Koreans, massacre of more than one million of them and its taking away 200,000 Korean women as "comfort women" for the Imperial Japanese Army as a separate issue from the economic cooperation. As regards the status of the Koreans in Japan, one of the issues to be settled for Japan's redemption of its past, the DPRK side recalled the background against which the Koreans were forced to settle in Japan and their present conditions and requested the Japanese side to stop the suppression of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan and the discrimination against the Koreans in Japan, guarantee them national education and promote it, enforce socio-economic policies for them and protect their economic activities. Turning to the issue of cultural treasures, the DPRK side reiterated its stand that Japan should unconditionally return all the cultural treasures it looted in Korea during its occupation of Korea on the principle of returning treasures to the places of their origin, restore the devastated cultural treasures to their former glory and compensate for those treasures which were so severely vandalized that it is hard to return and restore. Concerning the security issue, the DPRK side pointed out that its missile launch is an issue pertaining to its sovereignty from a to z and urged Japan to refrain from conducting such acts that may spark off serious concern about regional peace and stability as the enactment of a war law, the retrogressive revision of the constitution, nuclear weaponization and space militarization through the launch of spy satellites. As regards the abduction issue, the DPRK side reiterated the sincere efforts it has exerted for the settlement of this issue so far and its stand toward the issue and pointed to the injustice of the Japanese side's new assertions about the "repatriation of survivors," "probe into the truth" and "extradition of criminals," etc. It also strongly demanded Japan extradite the Japanese criminals who had lured and abducted DPRK citizens in recent years. The date and place of the next round of the talks will be fixed through diplomatic channels.
• "Pyongyang Will not Yield an Inch in Demanding Japan's Liquidation of Past"
  Interview with Song Il Ho, chief negotiator of DPRK-Japan Talks
  Song Il Ho The People's Korea interviewed Song Il Ho, ambassador in charge of DPRK-Japan talks of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, after the inter-governmental talks ended on February 8. He talked about Pyongyang's evaluation of the talks resumed after the suspension of three years and three months and how to settle the issue of Japan's liquidation of its past.
  There is a hostile relation between the DPRK and Japan. Many problems remain to be settled between the two countries. Efforts of the DPRK side alone could not settle the problems. Also Japan has to show sincerity and make every effort to settle the pending issues. The DPRK has made every effort and shown sincerity for the settlement of the "abduction issue." Japan's demand is that the DPRK should revive the dead and return them
  Q: What is the reason of the DPRK's assertion that the inquiry in the truth or falsehood of Japan's analysis of Yokota Megumi's remains is the principal matter for the settlement of the abduction issue? Regarding the investigation of the validity of Japan's analysis of Yokota Megumi's remains, meeting between Mr. Yoshii Tomio, former lecturer of Teikyo University who were in charge of the analysis, and experts from the DPRK side must be realized. The verification in the result of the analysis also must be made with the participation of Mr. Yoshii and DPRK experts. Yokota Megumi's remains should be returned to the DPRK side. Now that Japan concluded that Yokota's remains were fake, Japan does not have to have it. We have to return her remains to her bereaved family. They demand it. As long as the truth about the analysis of Yokota's remains, the abduction issue can never be settled. [Evidence]
• KCNA Urges Japan to Honestly Approach Inter-governmental Talks
  PYONGYANG, February 3 (KCNA)- We draw attention to the fact that the conservatives within the Japanese government are making remarks getting on the nerves of the DPRK in the run-up to the DPRK-Japan inter-governmental talks for the normalization of their relations. They have worked hard to build up the public opinion that the solution to the "abduction issue" should be given priority at the talks. Foreign Minister Aso at a full-dress meeting of the House of Representatives in January said that there could be no normalization of relations with the DPRK without the comprehensive settlement of pending issues including the abduction issue. Recently he formally announced that the Japanese abducted to North Korea number 50, much more than the figure reported in the past. Chief Cabinet Secretary Abe, too, blustered that Japan should strongly demand a comprehensive solution to the issue of Japanese abductees at the soon-to-be-resumed inter-governmental talks with the DPRK, adding that it is natural to pressurize North Korea in case it does not take a sincere approach. This is aimed to fan up sentiment and mindset hostile to the DPRK in a bid to block the implementation of the DPRK-Japan Pyongyang Declaration and the process of improving the bilateral relations. The Japanese conservative forces are not pleased with the talks for the normalization of bilateral relations. Their top priority is to achieve the political purpose pursued by them.
• Japan-Taiwan Ties Blossom As Regional Rivalry Grows
  Tokyo, Wary of China, Tilts Toward Taipei
  By Anthony Faiola Washington Post Foreign Service Friday, March 24, 2006; Page A12
  TAIPEI, Taiwan -- Early rising seniors have gathered for years to exercise among the yellow lotus blossoms and fuchsia rhododendrons of Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Park, the sprawling gardens in this island's capital. Now local residents stretch their limbs in slow-moving tai chi routines amid a landscape distinctly altered by the addition of 450 cherry trees, a national symbol of Japan. The trees, set in a park commemorating a leader who fought Japan during World War II, are among the first of more than 10,000 that Japanese and Taiwanese groups intend to plant across Taiwan. They are seen as emblems of the newly blooming relationship between the Pacific neighbors -- a tie that only underscores the competition for regional influence between Japan and China, East Asia's two major powers.
  With Japan seeking to shed a half-century of pacifism and reassert itself in world affairs, and China acquiring vastly larger economic and military might, relations between the two are as tense as they have been at any time since World War II. [Japanese remilitarisation] [China confrontation]
• U.S.-Japan-South Korea Military Coordination Targets China, North Korea
  By Kyodo News Agency WASHINGTON . The United States plans to launch "trilateral military cooperation" with Japan and South Korea to deal not only with North Korea but also with China and terrorist threats in Asia, Adm. William Fallon, head of the U.S. Pacific Command, said Tuesday. Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Fallon said the United States has been working to transform its bilateral defense alliances with the two nations to deal with regional and global issues and develop them into a stronger trilateral initiative. [China confrontation] [Threat]
• GNP leader joins a chorus of criticism of Japan
  March 09, 2006 ? TOKYO ? In a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi yesterday, Grand National Chairwoman Park Geun-hye urged Japanese leaders to keep their words and actions consistent, referring to Mr. Koizumi's controversial visits to a Japanese war memorial, the Yasukuni Shrine.
  Ms. Park also met with other conservative politicians including Shinzo Abe, the chief cabinet secretary, and Minister for Foreign Affairs Taro Aso.
• KCNA Hit Japanese FM's Assertion on "Abduction Issue"
  PYONGYANG, February 23 (KCNA)- Before and after the recent DPRK-Japan talks in Beijing, the Japanese authorities insisted that the "abduction issue" is a core issue to be settled at the talks. Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso has been most vociferous in this regard. He asserted at the session of the House of Representatives that there would be no normalization of bilateral relations without a solution to the "abduction issue." He went the lengths of saying that it was quite wrong to think that such action as infiltrating into other country to take its people as hostage could work on anyone and that such deed is a mockery of Japan. Then, why has Aso been so keen on the issue of whereabouts of a few Japanese only out of major agenda items at the talks and why is he so vociferous about the "abduction issue" which had already found a solution? Is he behaving so because he is more concerned for "people's sentiment" than any others or because he is foreign minister of Japan? To explain the reason, we cannot but tell the behind-the-scene story about Aso and his clan. Aso is a descendent of one of the blood-suckers as they took away many Koreans to Japan to force slave labor upon them and accumulated wealth at the cost of their sweat and blood in the last centuries. The Asos' history has been woven with monstrous crimes. Aso's great-great-grandfather set up Aso Coal Mine Co. in 1872, forcing Koreans to do medieval slave labor for many generations. According to data, many Korean workers were forcibly taken to the coal mines run by Aso's great grandfather early in the 1930s to toil and moil there. The number of those workers ran up to 1.12 million after 1939. There are graves of hundreds of unknown Korean workers at a Buddhist temple around the Tsikuo coal field abandoned by the Asos in the 1960s. This makes one easily guess how many Korean workers the Asos drove to death, taking the company as a whole. The facts go to prove that the Asos are directly responsible for the issue of slave labor forced on Koreans and not a small share of responsibility for Japan's compensation for its past crimes rests with them.
• KCNA Blasts Japanese Ultra-Right Forces' Remarks against DPRK
  PYONGYANG, February 20 (KCNA)- Japanese ultra-right conservative forces are busy using the fruitless DPRK-Japan inter-governmental talks for their smear campaign against the DPRK, calling for "the application of more sanctions" and "increased pressure" upon it. The chief Cabinet secretary, the foreign minister and other ultra-right conservatives of Japan recently did not bother to make such reckless remarks underscoring the need to increase its pressure upon the DPRK, blaming it for the fruitless DPRK-Japan talks. Meanwhile, the Japanese government has set out proposals for escalating pressures upon the DPRK such as the raise of tax levies on the establishments related to the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan, strict security inspection of DPRK ships and control over them.
• Japan's Foreign Minister Raps S. Korea, China for Aiding N. Korea
  TOKYO (Yonhap) -- Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso has expressed his dissatisfaction with South Korean and Chinese policies toward North Korea, according to Japanese media on Thursday. Speaking to the budget committee at the House of Councilors on Wednesday, Japan's top diplomat was quoted as saying, "South Korea and China are helping North Korea. I can't understand why they do so?" He was responding to opposition lawmakers' questions on how Tokyo aims to resolve the issue of Japanese civilians kidnapped by North Korean agents in the 1970s and 1980s. The issue has become the biggest stumbling block to normalizing diplomatic ties between the two countries. Aso took issue with the two friendly nations' increasing trade volume with North Korea despite a sharp decrease in Japan's trade with the isolated communist country. According to Japan's Foreign Ministry, trade between North Korea and Chine soared to $1.6 billion last year from $480 million in 2004. Inter-Korean trade jumped 51.5 percent year-on-year to $1.06 billion in 2005, as South Korea is also continuing its efforts to engage the North. But Japan's trade with North Korea has shrunk from $460 million to $190 million. [Sanctions]
• 700th comfort women rally
  700th rally for Japanese apology: A group of former comfort women and members of local civic organizations chant a slogan calling on Japan to apologize for atrocities committed by its military during World War II, in front of the Japanese Embassy in central Seoul, Wednesday. Wednesday marked the 700th of the rally. They are held every Wednesday [Photo]
• China Rivalry Fuels Japan's FTA drive
  By Masaki Hisane Japan is revving up its drive toward free-trade agreements, or FTAs, with trading partners, largely fueled by an intensifying rivalry with China, a rapidly ascendant economic as well as military power. Japanese and Chinese national flags As the World Trade Organization's trade talks falter, countries all over the world are pursuing their own separate FTAs with trading partners. Bilateral or regional integrations, especially in the form of FTAs, have popped up all over the world since the early 1990s. They include the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the European Union (EU) and Mercosur, a Latin American customs union initially comprised of Argentina , Brazil, Paraguy and Uruguay. In East Asia, too, many countries are now competing for FTAs with trading partners in and outside the region. [China competition]
• Yasukuni Shrine on the Silver Screen: Spirits of the state
  By James L. Huffman Yasukuni Shrine, home for a century and a half to the spirits of Japan's fallen soldiers, has fueled controversy in every decade of my academic career. When I arrived in Tokyo as the 1970s were about to dawn, great numbers of students and young radicals across the nation were working in concert with writers, professors, and Christian theologians of all ages in opposition to the state's ties to the Shinto institution. In the mid-1980s, I attended a dinner at which Prime Minister Nakasone Yasuhiro sought (and received) the support of several prominent American scholars for his much-criticized visits to Yasukuni as prime minister. While I was visiting Beijing several years ago, Prime Minister Koizumi Jun'ichiro made one of his periodic visits to the shrine, touching off a level of anger that I could only grasp by being in China. And today, as I write this from Tokyo, the Chinese assert that they will judge Japan's next political leader by one issue above all others: whether he visits Yasukuni.
• Race to the Bottom?
  Japanese Multinational Firms and the Future of the Lifetime Employment System
  By Leonard Schoppa In January the leaders of two great automobile companies made separate appearances before the media of their respective countries to demonstrate how Japanese- and American-style capitalism continue to differ.
• An August Storm: the Soviet-Japan Endgame in the Pacific War
  By Mark Ealey In a postbellum environment, far more war crimes are ultimately left untouched than are ever pursued in tribunals. This is particularly true if the victors commit the crimes against the vanquished. If that victor is a superpower, the difficulties involved in the pursuit of justice increase exponentially. As World War II entered its final stages the belligerent powers committed one heinous act after another: the Japanese military massacred civilians in Manila and murdered allied prisoners of war and slave laborers in an attempt to hide the evidence of their barbaric treatment, not to mention the ongoing acts of brutality in China. On the victors' side, while the United States and Britain bombed German and Japanese cities and their civilian inhabitants into oblivion to "bring the war to a speedy end," the Soviet Union was unleashing acts of vengeance on the German population. Fresh from victory over the Nazi regime and emboldened by favorable political developments in Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union turned its attention to Japan.
• DPRK Delegation Leaves for Talks with Japan
  Pyongyang, February 4 (KCNA) -- A DPRK government delegation led by Song Il Ho, ambassador in charge of DPRK-Japan talks of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, left here today for Beijing to attend the DPRK-Japan intergovernmental talks for the normalization of bilateral relations. It was seen off at the airport by officials concerned and the Chinese ambassador to the DPRK.
• Did It Really Help to be a Japanese Colony?: East Asian Economic Performance in Historical Perspective
  Anne Booth SOAS University of London ab10@soas.ac.uk
  June 2005 Asia Research Institute Working Paper Series No. 43 ARI Working Paper No. 43 Asia Research Institute ? Singapore Did It Really Help to be a Japanese Colony?: East Asian Economic Performance in Historical Perspective1 "Japan has always been growth-oriented, in colonial areas as well as at home; and it is clear that Japanese rule helped to initiate intensive growth in both Korea and Taiwan" (Reynolds 1983: 956) "However much it may pain the majority of Korean nationalists and the minority of Taiwanese nationalists, the place to begin in comprehending the region's economic dynamism is with the advent of Japanese imperialism" (Cumings 1984b: 8). Japanese colonialism was more developmental than that of other countries because it involved a greater effort to transfer and develop technology, higher physical investment, and better development of local education and human capital (Maddison 1990: 365). In the second part of the twentieth century, the two former Japanese colonies of Taiwan and the Republic of Korea have 'forged ahead' in the race for economic growth, and have achieved considerable success in narrowing the gap in per capita GDP between themselves and both the USA and Japan.
• KCNA Urges Japan to Honestly Approach DPRK-Japan Inter-governmental Talks
  Pyongyang, February 3 (KCNA) -- We draw attention to the fact that the conservatives within the Japanese government are making remarks getting on the nerves of the DPRK in the run-up to the DPRK-Japan inter-governmental talks for the normalization of their relations. They have worked hard to build up the public opinion that the solution to the "abduction issue" should be given priority at the talks. Foreign Minister Aso at a full-dress meeting of the House of Representatives in January said that there could be no normalization of relations with the DPRK without the comprehensive settlement of pending issues including the abduction issue. Recently he formally announced that the Japanese abducted to north Korea number 50, much more than the figure reported in the past. Chief Cabinet Secretary Abe, too, blustered that Japan should strongly demand a comprehensive solution to the issue of Japanese abductees at the soon-to-be-resumed inter-governmental talks with the DPRK, adding that it is natural to pressurize north Korea in case it does not take a sincere approach. This is aimed to fan up sentiment and mindset hostile to the DPRK in a bid to block the implementation of the DPRK-Japan Pyongyang Declaration and the process of improving the bilateral relations. The Japanese conservative forces are not pleased with the talks for the normalization of bilateral relations. Their top priority is to achieve the political purpose pursued by them.
• Japan's Bid for Permanent Seat at UNSC Assailed
  Pyongyang, February 2 (KCNA) -- Japan is making more desperate efforts in the new year to get a permanent seat at the UN Security Council. Rodong Sinmun says this today in a signed article. It goes on: It is the ulterior intention of Japan to hold the permanent membership of the UN Security Council with the backing of the U.S., its superior. To this end Japan is busy working out a new "resolution", conducting prior diplomatic activities with the U.S. and so on.
• Roh asks Japan to match deeds to words
  March 02, 2006 ? President Roh Moo-hyun reiterated his harsh words about Japan in a speech yesterday commemorating a 1919 uprising here against the Japanese colonial government. "If Japan aims to be a 'normal state,' or a 'leading state' or a 'leading country in the world,'" Mr. Roh said, "it must act in conformity with human conscience and principles to gain the confidence of the world." Apparently targeting Japan's plans to revise its constitution to give more latitude to its military, the Self-Defense Forces, Mr. Roh added, "It must not pursue revisions of the law and military expansion." [Yasukuni] [Japanese remilitarisaton]
• Monument to Victory Battle in Northern Area of Korea Handed over
  Kaesong, March 1 (KCNA) -- A ceremony of handing over the monument to the victory in the battle in the northern area of Korea took place at the Kaesong Koryo Museum today. Present there from the north side were Kim Sok Hwan, chairman of the Measure Committee for the Retaking the "Monument to the Victory in the Battle in the Northern Area of Korea", Sim Sang Jin, vice-chairman of the Central Committee of the Korean Buddhist Federation, and other officials concerned and from the south side Om Thae Jong, chairman of the Central Committee of the National Movement for the Monument, Kim Won Ung and Yu Hong Jun, co-chairmen of the Committee for Promoting the Retrieval of the Monument, and other officials concerned. A report on how the monument has been retrieved was made at the ceremony. Then followed speeches. An anti-Japanese statement was made public.
• Joint Declaration of North and South Sides Published
  Pyongyang, March 1 (KCNA) -- The Central Committee of the Chondoist Chongu Party and the Council for the Reunification of Tangun's Nation from the north side and the Society for the Reunification of Tonghak's Nation and the General Federation of National Movement Camp from the south side published a joint declaration in which they agreed to set the period of the three-point patriotic movement for independent reunification, peace against war and great national unity till November 17 when the "Ulsa Five-point Treaty" was fabricated by the Japanese imperialists and wage a dynamic joint struggle.
• Roh Urges Japan to Act on Atrocities
  By Jung Sung-ki Staff Reporter President Roh Moo-hyun speaks at a ceremony marking the 87th anniversary of the March 1 Independence Movement Day in Seoul, Wednesday. /Korea Times President Roh Moo-hyun on Wednesday urged Japan to face up to history by taking concrete actions to reflect the apologies Japanese leaders have made so far for the atrocities it committed during World War II. In a speech marking the 87th anniversary of the March 1 Independence Movement against Japanese colonial rule, Roh strongly criticized Tokyo's mishandling of its wartime misdeeds, including Japanese leaders' repeated visits to the controversial Yasukuni Shrine honoring war criminals.
• Roh Raps Koizumi Over War Shrine Visits
  Former 'comfort women' forced to become sex slaves to the Japanese military during World War II hold a silent candlelight protest in front of the Japanese Embassy in March last year. Korea Marks Independence Movement Day President Roh Moo-hyun on Wednesday lashed out at Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visits to a war shrine in Tokyo that honors convicted war criminals among the country's fallen. Roh urged Japan to reflect on its past. The remarks were part of the president's speech marking the 86th anniversary of the March 1, 1919 Independence Movement, when Koreans across the nation staged a mass uprising against the Japanese occupier. Roh dismissed Koizumi's claims that his worship at the shrine is variously meant to reaffirm the island nation's resolve against war or carried out in a personal capacity and does not warrant outside interference. The actions and words of national leaders are judged by their effect, not by the justifications they give for them, Roh said.
• U.S.-Japan exercise uses North as 'enemy'
  March 01, 2006 ? A joint military exercise in Japan that began Thursday pits U.S. and Japanese forces against hypothetical provocations by North Korea and China, a Japanese daily said yesterday. The Sankei Shimbun said the exercises, which involve only command post staff and not actual troop movements, are simulating such contingencies as North Korean moves to fuel its ballistic missiles. The newspaper said that if that happened, Japanese nationals in Korea would be evacuated and Japan Self Defense Force aircraft would provide security for their repatriation flights. The exercises, called "Keen Edge," are scheduled regularly, and test the ability of Japanese and U.S. forces in Japan to work together. The newspaper said Japanese military forces will be reorganized under a single operational command next month. [Threat] [China confrontation]
• Independence Movements Took Place Worldwide
  By Chung Ah-young Staff Reporter This is a script of the March 1 Independence Declaration which was used by Koreans living in Mexico on every March 1, expressing hope for the nation's liberation from Japan. /Courtesy of the Independence Hall of Korea South Koreans today mark the 87th anniversary of the March 1 Independence Movement against Japanese colonial rule. On that day back in 1919, independence fighters, students and other Koreans took to the streets throughout the country, shouting for the nation's sovereignty from the Japanese occupation.
• U.S.-Japan Drills 'Gear Up for China-N.Korea Threat'
  North Korea and China are the imaginary enemy in military drills the U.S. and Japan have been conducting since Feb. 23, the Sankei Shimbun reported Tuesday. The command post exercises dubbed Keen Edge continue through Friday and come ahead of air, land and sea drills Japan's Self Defense Force is scheduled to start at the end of March. The aim of Keen Edge is to coordinate communication and command and information flow between the U.S. Forces Japan and the island country's military. Neighboring countries have each been given a color: Japan is blue, the U.S. is green, North Korea is purple, Russia is red and South Korea is the color of tea, the daily said. The war games include a simulation where the U.S. finds North Korea getting ready to fire a ballistic missile, whereupon the allies quickly move to defend the borders while U.S. Navy and Air Force stationed in Japan along with the Japanese Maritime Defense Forces step up surveillance in the East Sea with Aegis ships and other vessels. One scenario provides for Japan's air forces to evacuate Japanese nationals from Korea as tensions on the peninsula escalate. Another prepares for Chinese warships and submarines massing in the East China Sea while a group of apparent civilians make illegal landfall on an uninhabited island disputed by China and Japan before the Chinese vessels invade Japanese territorial waters nearby. That is met by intensified patrols from Japan's Maritime Self Defense Force and mobilization of warships and aircraft. Meanwhile, ground forces stationed in Kyushu prepare to counter an attack from Chinese forces, while the Air Self-Defense Force is given orders to move F15 fighters from the mainland to Naha Air Force base on Okinawa and Miyagozima Airport. The scenario is also designed to hone communication among the Prime Minister's Office, the Coast Guard and police. In Tokyo's 2005 strategic plans, China and North Korea are designated "countries threatening Japan's safety," and while chances of an invasion from China are rated "low," an invasion from North Korea is considered "an existing possibility." [Threat] [China confrontation] [Bizarre]
• Seoul Regrets Shimane's Dokdo Day Event
  By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter The government on Wednesday expressed ``strong'' regrets over a western Japanese prefecture's hosting of a ceremony, marking Japan's claim of sovereignty over the Dokdo islets, which have been under the administration of South Korea. But high-ranking officials in Seoul refrained from publicly criticizing the Japanese government, rather just confirming the official stance of Seoul over the issue.
• Japan Denounced for Claims to Dokdo Islets
  By Kim Tong-hyung Staff Reporter Hundreds of people rallied in front of the Japanese Embassy in downtown Seoul Tuesday, denouncing Japanese claims to Dokdo. Dokdo, a rocky set of islets off Korea's eastern coast, became a subject of political tension between Korea and Japan after the Shimane prefecture on Japan's west coast last year passed on ordinance to designate Feb. 22 as ``Takeshima Day'' to mark its claim over the islets currently controlled by Korea.

• Japan, North revive talks on mutual ties
  February 02, 2006 ? Confirming an announcement from Tokyo, Pyongyang's Korean Central News Agency said yesterday that North Korean and Japanese officials would meet in Beijing on Saturday to restart talks on diplomatic recognition.
• DPRK-Japan Inter-governmental Talks to be Held
  Pyongyang, February 1 (KCNA) -- The DPRK-Japan inter-governmental talks for the normalization of bilateral relations are to be held in Beijing from Feb. 4. The talks will discuss pending issues of mutual concern including issues related to Japan's settlement of its past, the security issue and the abduction issue.
• North Korean Agency Denounces Japan's Imperialism
  SEOUL (Yonhap) _ A North Korean committee has denounced the establishment of the Japanese government- general in Korea 100 years ago, the state-run (North) Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported Tuesday.
• Second Korea-Japan History Team to Revisit Past
  A joint Korean-Japanese group of experts set up to look at the reality behind historical teachings in the two nations will start work in March. It is the second such team. The first, put together in 2001 when controversy about alleged distortions in Japanese textbooks first ignited, had no government officials among its members and never got round to scrutinizing the offending textbooks.
• Japan Howls About 70 North Korea Abductions, Not Sorry About Its One Million Korean Slaves
  Foreign Minister Taro Aso's Dirty Secret
  By CHRISTOPHER REED in Tokyo February 2, 2006
  Japan's "top priority" in new talks with North Korea opening Saturday, February 4, in Beijing, will be the case of 15 of its citizens abducted to Pyongyang between 1977-83. But absent from Tokyo's agenda will be another unresolved disgrace: decades of enforced removal to Japan for work-slavery of a million Koreans -- including 12,000 laborers compelled to work under grotesque conditions in coal mines owned by a firm still run by the family of Japan's foreign minister, Taro Aso. [Double standards] [Abductees]
• Best not to go to Yasukuni
  [EDITORIALS] The Japanese Foreign Minister, Taro Aso, said it would be "best" for the Japanese emperor to pay his respects at the Yasukuni Shrine. This probably means that the emperor, who represents Japan as a symbol and thus can't be free from the reponsibility of the war, should come forward. Even if one considers that Mr. Aso's remarks were made aiming at the upcoming election of the prime minister, these are words that should have been refrained from. South Korea and China have said nothing on many other shrines, but have expressed their concern only in regard to the Yasukuni Shrine. Why? Because the shrine is the chief religious body that glorifies Japan's history of invasion.
• Minister wants visits to shrine by emperor
  January 31, 2006 ? Taro Aso, Japan's foreign minister, asserted over the weekend that regional protests over visits to the Yasukuni Shrine were making it more likely that Japanese political leaders would continue to go there. "The more China complains, the more one feels like going there," the Kyodo News agency reported him as saying. He added that a visit by the Japanese emperor would be "the best." He advised Beijing, "It would be best to keep quiet." Hirohito, the father of the current emperor Akihito, visited the shrine regularly after his country's defeat in World War II, but stopped after plaques memorializing officials executed by the Allies for war crimes were installed in 1978. Akihito also pays respects at a less controversial war memorial. Korea's Foreign Ministry called the remarks "regrettable."
• NK, Japan to Resume Talks
  North Korea and Japan will resume talks in Beijing on Saturday to discuss normalizing diplomatic ties, according to Japan's top government spokesman. The working-level talks will also deal with Pyongyang's abductions of Japanese citizens and the communist regime's nuclear weapons program, Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe said. The two sides held working-level talks on establishing diplomatic ties in November

• Japan's Iran Dilemma and Oil
  By KAMIGURI TAKASHI and ABE HIDEAKI
  [Japan Focus 30 January 2006]
  [We present three articles on Iran in the crosshairs, examining the conflict over Iran in light of moves by the US, UN, Japan, EU and Israel. The central issue concerns the US effort to bring Iran before the UN Security Council for its refusal to terminate the development of its civilian nuclear power program. It is a course that many see as the essential step toward US-directed regime change.
  The third article (this one), from the Asahi Shimbun, sets Japan's oil dependence on Iran, and particularly the decision about whether to proceed with its investment in the Azadegan oil fields, against the US-led pressures to bring Iran before the Security Council. Japan Focus]
• Unrequited Responsibility: Japan, Iran and Israel
  By Mindy Kotler
  [Japan Focus 30 January 2006]
  In the first article, Mindy Kotler, Director of Asia Policy Point, examines critically Japan's reluctance to join the US-led bandwagon on Iran, highlighting the failure to criticize the Iranian president's statements on Israel and the holocaust, and noting Japan's heavy dependence on Iranian oil. She also hints at another potent factor: like Iran, Japan is actively pursuing the development of nuclear power for civilian uses. Unlike Iran, however, Japan's effort is advancing with US and EU tacit support. Japan did in fact vote with the US to bring Iran before the UN Security Council, as well as privately pressing Iran to halt its nuclear development program. Kotler notes important Japanese interests in Iranian oil. But she attributes Japan's reluctance to play a forward role in condemning Iran to a failure of its diplomacy. Where some see Japan's diplomatic failure to center on its Prime Minister's provocative visits to Yasukuni Shrine and other acts antagonizing its neighbors, Kotler believes that a more forward role on such issues as Iran are the prerequisites if Japan's is to succeed in its quest for a permanent Security Council seat. In declining to discuss the legitimacy of Iran's claims to develop civilian nuclear power, the article implicitly reiterates the US position on the issues.
• Japan's new energy strategy
  By Masaki Hisane
  [Japan Focus 23 January 2006]
  [ Masaki Hisane provides an excellent survey of the energy challenges confronting Japan while suggesting some of the problems with the new energy policy regime about to be officially adopted by the Koizumi Administration. The issues are pertinent not only to Japan but throughout the Asia Pacific and globally. First the challenges: Japan, like all other nations, now faces the strong possibility that fossil fuel supplies and energy politics will be fraught in the coming years, resulting in upward pressure on prices. In Tokyo and other parts of Japan, for example, unseasonably cold weather has boosted the demand for fuel, and sharply driven up the cost of heating oil along with winter vegetables and other products. The country's heavy dependence on imported fossil fuels is thus keenly felt by consumers. But it is systemic problems at the regional and global levels that pose the largest problems. Robust economic growth elsewhere, notably in China and India, presents a seemingly insatiable global appetite for more oil and gas. At the same time, the major oil producers have at best minimal margins of spare production capacity. While producers are investing in new sources of supply, the cost of exploration is skyrocketing due to the demand for rigs and other equipment as well as the risks, remoteness and other challenges attendant on new finds. All indicators suggest that the very tight squeeze between demand and supply will be protracted. Power and wealth are thus flowing into the hands of the big exporting countries. [Energy security]
• Koizumi's Obstinacy Could Isolate Japan: Yasukuni and Asia
  Kwan Weng Kin
  [Japan Focus 23 January 2006]
  [Before your eyes glaze over at the thought of yet another article on Yasukuni visits, please note that the issue is metastasizing in the Japanese press and the country's foreign relations. Notable, for one thing, is the fact that this article by Kwan Weng Kin ran in the Singapore Straits Times, not in the People's Daily or the Korea Times. Moreover, as Kwan points out, Koizumi is coming under fire from much of Japan's media and large swathes of the foreign-policy and economic elite for his obstinacy.
  Indeed, virtually everyone knows that Koizumi's visits to Yasukuni cause friction with neighbouring countries. What is less well-understood in Japan is that "neighbouring countries" does not only mean China and South Korea. This is because Koizumi and other prominent government figures - such as Foreign Minister Aso Taro - have been able, at least until recently, to get away with pretending that only China and Korea oppose the Yasukuni visits. They seek to exploit discontent with China and Korea as well as to suggest that the political and economic costs of the Yasukuni visits are minimal. But Koizumi's Yasukuni pilgrimages continue to be opposed by plenty of governments and groups outside of China and Korea. The criticism goes back to Koizumi's first visit on August 13 2001. Not only China and South Korea reacted. The Vietnamese and Filipino governments also issued statements expressing concern and regret. There was also criticism from Filipino comfort women, Australian veterans and others. And major newspapers throughout Asia, the US and Europe have openly criticized each visit. [Softpower]
• Pyongyang may hold secret info on missiles
  By KANAKO TAKAHARA Staff writer Confidential data on a Defense Agency surface-to-air missile system may have been leaked to a group affiliated with the pro-Pyongyang General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryun) in 1995, the Defense Agency said Tuesday. Police reportedly obtained documents with the leaked data in a raid on the Science Technology Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Kwahyop), Chongryun's umbrella group, on a separate charge in October. If the report proves correct, it is possible the data, which included figures on SAM capabilities, may have been handed over to North Korea. The data were marked "confidential" -- the lowest of the agency's three secrecy levels. The Ground Self-Defense Force began deploying a medium-range SAM in 2003. But a Defense Agency official who briefed reporters claimed the data would not reveal the capabilities of the currently deployed medium-range SAM. [Military balance] [Espionage]
• Koizumi's Retort
  Tokyo Should Pay Heed to Advice From Seoul and Bejing
  As usual, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi defended on Tuesday his visits to the Yasukuni Shrine which honors Japan's 2.5 million war dead. Standing before the Japanese House of Councilors, Koizumi complained that no country in Asia other than South Korea and China criticized his visits to the shrine. However, his defense could further strain relations between Seoul and Tokyo as it came only hours after President Roh Moo-hyun urged Koizumi to stop visiting the controversial shrine. In his New Year's press conference, President Roh called on Koizumi to be "more sensitive" to the sentiments of the Korean people. We believe that Koizumi's immediate retort to President Roh's advice is nothing but a denial of the ethics of diplomacy. Koizumi, who is scheduled to step down in the latter half of this year, has visited the shrine every year since he took office in 2001, paying no heed to calls from Seoul and Beijing to stop
• Japan, North Korea Plan to Resume Talks
  By KANA INAGAKI The Associated Press Thursday, January 26, 2006; 10:50 PM
  TOKYO -- Japan and North Korea will meet in Beijing next month to discuss normalizing relations, Pyongyang's abductions of Japanese citizens and the communist regime's nuclear weapons program. The talks will start Feb. 4 and run for several days, Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary, Shinzo Abe, told reporters. "We aim to achieve general progress in relations between North Korea and Japan," Abe said, adding that Japan's top priority would be the abduction issue. [Spin] [Media]
• 'Japanese Premier Must Stop Shrine Visit '
  By Seo Dong-shin Staff Reporter President Roh Moo-hyun said on Wednesday that the South Korea-Japan shuttle summit will not likely resume until Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi drops his controversial pilgrimages to the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo. .
• Book "Relationship between Paekje and Woe (Japan)" off Press
  Pyongyang, January 19 (KCNA) -- The Publishing House of Social Sciences of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea recently published the book "Relationship between Paekje and Woe (Japan)". The book authored by Prof. and Dr. Jo Hui Sung has a prologue, an epilogue and five chapters -- "Occasion and period that people of Paekje make inroads into Japanese islands", "Formation of small kingdom, Paekje", "Pro-Kaya and pro-Paekje forces of Kawachiwa Yamato", "Integration of western Japan by pro-Paekje Yamato government reflected in 'Nihongshoki (History of Japan)'" and "Relationship between Paekje and Woe (Yamato) in 7th century". The book writes that a group of Koguryo people went south and established a small feudal state in the third century B.C., which developed into Paekje. The book deals with the relationship between Paekje and Woe (Japan)--the big role and position of Paekje people in the establishment of a unified state in Japan and their influence on the historical development of Japan.
• Japan Hopes Rocket Will Help Space Program
  By ERIC TALMADGE The Associated Press Thursday, January 19, 2006; 2:07 PM
  TANEGASHIMA, Japan -- First, a technical glitch forced the launch date to be set back. Then a thunderstorm came in and hit this remote island in southern Japan with buckets of rain and howling winds. Fighting to get back on schedule after a fiery failure two years ago and running well behind China is Asia's budding space race, Japan's space agency is praying for sunshine _ and a little bit of luck.
  "Weather is our main problem right now, but you have to always keep the other possible problems in mind," Tatsuo Oshima, a spokesman for Japan's space agency, known as JAXA, said Thursday as the rocket remained in its hangar. Japan's latest H-2A rocket _ the black, orange and white launch vehicle that is the centerpiece of this country's space program _ is intended to put the four-ton Advanced Land Observation Satellite into orbit. The satellite, which has three remote sensing instruments, will provide topographic data for use in the production of more detailed maps. But getting this launch out of the way has a deeper significance to Tokyo because it will clear the pad on this tiny, lush island for a much more high-profile mission _ the launching of two spy satellites by March 2007 to monitor North Korea and other trouble spots. That program, approved after North Korea launched a missile over Japan's main island in 1998, began with the liftoff of two spy satellites in March 2003. Tokyo put aside $2 billion for the project, prompting protests from North Korea that Tokyo was triggering a regional arms race. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Rocketry] [Threat]
• Japanese Envoy Sees China Threat
  By Reuben Staines Staff Reporter
  Japan's top envoy to South Korea Thursday said Seoul and Tokyo must rebuild their strained ties to jointly counter the potential security threat posed by China. Addressing a meeting of alumni at the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in eastern Seoul, Japanese Ambassador Shotaro Oshima said his country welcomes China's economic rise but worries about its geopolitical intentions. ``In terms of international politics, how China reforms its domestic politics and enhances transparency in its military is a concern for Northeast Asia,'' he said. Oshima urged South Korea to show understanding toward Japan's recent moves to revise its pacifist constitution. Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party has been pushing to loosen the country's post-war constitution to allow it to play a greater role in international security. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Yasukuni] [China confrontation]
• Japanese Photographer Records Testimony of 'Comfort Women'
  By Bridget O'Brien Staff Reporter
  Japanese photographer Tsukasa Yajima, right, joins survivor of Japanese military sexual slavery Lee Ok-seon at a testimony in Okinawa on Oct. 15, 2005. KWANGJU, Kyonggi Province _ With the evening meal just over, two halmoni (grandmothers) sat on opposite sides of a couch vigorously exchanging points on what seemed quite a serious matter. From his seat in the dining room, Tsukasa Yajima went to investigate. He returned, chuckling, explaining their argument was over the best way to wipe the table. Japanese photojournalist Yajima, 34, is a researcher at the House Of Sharing, the home of eight survivors of Japanese Military sexual slavery. He organizes the Peace Road program, inviting groups of international students, particularly Japanese, to visit the ``Nanum Jip,'' the House of Sharing and the Museum of Japanese Military Sexual Slavery.
• Japan Set to Waive Visa for Koreans from March : Report
  TOKYO (Yonhap) -- Japan will likely allow South Korean tourists to visit for up to 90 days without a visa from March this year, a Japanese daily reported Tuesday. The Tokyo Shimbun said the Japanese government has embarked on working out details for making the measure permanent after February, when a temporary visa waiver program ends. Japan has extended the program allowing South Korean visitors longer stays until the end of next month, despite the fact that the move inspiring World Expo ended in central Japan last September. The permanent visa waiver program is seen as aimed at further promoting tourism. Some 1.6 million South Korean tourists visited Japan in 2004, according to tourism officials.
• Seoul, Tokyo to Sign Judicial Cooperation Treaty Friday
  > By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter
  South Korea and Japan will sign a treaty on judicial cooperation on Friday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade in Seoul said on Monday. The treaty on ``mutual legal assistance in criminal matters'' will be signed by Ra Jong-yil, South Korea's ambassador to Japan, and Taro Aso, Japan's foreign minister, in Tokyo. ``The treaty makes it legally possible for the judicial authorities in both countries to transmit requested documents and help each other conducting criminal investigations,'' a foreign ministry official in Seoul said.
• The Coming Internationalization: Can Japan assimilate its immigrants?
  By Arudou Debito
  With the recent ethnic riots in France, The Economist (London) ran a thoughtful article ("Minority Reports") on their causes. It posed an important question: Why are some countries able to assimilate immigrants and their children more peacefully than others? It took a stab at comparing "integrationist" vs. "assimilationist" public policies in France, England, Germany, Holland, and the United States.
  Naturally, the article did not mention Japan, as Japan does not have much of a record regarding immigration. Registered foreigners (i.e. those with legal visas staying for more than three months), assuming previous growth rates continued through 2005, probably topped two million for the first time in postwar Japan. However, in a country of 127.7 million, this amounts to 1.6% of the total population--slender compared to 4.6% (2003) in Britain, 5.5% (1999) in France, 9.7% (2002) in Germany, 12.1% (2005, legal and illegal) in the US, and 21.8% (2001) in Australia. [1] However, these figures will change, as Japan's population of foreigners will continue to grow. I believe Japan's future as a multiethnic society is inevitable.
• The Constitution is Japan's Pledge of Peace to the World
  By Fukushima Mizuho
  Four months after the landslide re-election of Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro, Fukushima Mizuho, leader of Japan's Social Democrats (SDP), paints a through-the-looking-glass picture of the country Koizumi has helmed since 2001.
  Even as much of the world's press hails the return of economic prosperity following the publication of Japan's best economic figures for more than a decade, Fukushima highlights the fallout from the Koizumi reforms: growing income and wealth disparities, social breakdown, declining birthrates and one of the most casualized economies in the developed world, providing a dystopic image of the once vaunted lifetime employment system.
  But it is on the issue of subservience to US foreign policy and mooted constitutional reform that Fukushima takes strongest issue. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Rare photo of independence fighter: Ahn Joong-guen,
  The photo shows late independent fighter Ahn Joong-guen, fourth from right, meeting with two of his younger brothers in a prison in Dalian, Liaoning province, China, in March 1910. The photo, carried in the January edition of a North Korean monthly illustrated magazine Choson, was taken prior to Ahn's execution for the 1909 assassination of Japanese Residents-General in Korea, Hirobumi Ito. At the meeting, Ahn was said to have asked his brothers to bury him at Harbin, China, and later move his body to a free Korea. [Japanese colonialism]
• A Chronicle of Korea-Japan 'Friendship'
  By James Card
  [Japan Focus 9 January 2006]
  For Japan and Korea, 2005 held anniversaries perhaps more fraught than commemorations Japan shared with many other nations last year. Throughout the world, it was the sixtieth anniversary of the end of World War II, but Japan was not at war with Korea in 1945. Rather, Japan's August 1945 surrender to the Allies ended the nation's harsh colonization of Korea, an occupation that began in 1905 when Japan won protectorate rights over Korea as a war prize for defeating Russia. Recognizing 2005 in centennial tones was not in the cards, however, because the history and legacy of Japan's colonization remain so violently disputed. Rather, Tokyo and Seoul recognized last year as a "Year of Friendship" to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the 1965 Treaty on Basic Relations between Japan and South Korea. As James Card neatly summarizes, the year devolved daily into bitter acrimony as Koreans responded angrily to Japan's claims to the Takeshima (Dokdo) Islets that it had initially seized in 1905, and South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun called for a review of Korean collaborators under Japanese colonial rule, a call that has immediate repercussions in contemporary politics. Compounding these problems are deep differences between Japan and South Korea on the normalization of Japan and North Korea. Normalization is complicated by the fact that North and South Korea did not exist during the colonial era - only Korea did. This last conundrum reminds us that 2005 was the sixtieth anniversary of Dean Rusk's famous line at the 38th parallel that has divided the Korean peninsula ever since.
• Abe's Wicked Sophism under Fire
  Pyongyang, January 2 (KCNA) -- Some days ago, Abe, chief Cabinet secretary of Japan, asserted that it is the view of the government that it would be impossible to normalize DPRK-Japan relations unless the "abduction issue" is settled and called for "sincere response" from Pyongyang. Minju Joson today observes in a signed commentary in this regard: What is most essential for settling the issues related to the DPRK-Japan relations is not the "abduction issue" but the issue of Japan's liquidation of its past crimes. The present hostile relations between the DPRK and Japan originated from Japan's crime-woven past and these bilateral relations have not yet improved chiefly because Japan has not redressed its crimes.
• Pro-Japan Collaborators Owned Lands, 13 Times Larger Than Seoul
  By Kim Rahn Staff Reporter The area of the land owned by pro-Japanese collaborators during the 1910-1945 colonial rule reached more than 130 million pyong (about 443 square kilometers), 13 times larger than the size of then Seoul, according to a report Tuesday. The amount of land owned by individual collaborators have been disclosed before, but it is the first time the total amount has been reported. A total of 41 representative collaborators owned 134.8 million pyong of land on the Korean Peninsula, according to a thesis by Hong Kyung-sun, a researcher of the Korea Advance Policy Institute. [Japanese collaborator]
• DPRK-Japan Inter-governmental Contacts Made
  Pyongyang, December 26 (KCNA) -- A report on the DPRK-Japan inter-governmental contacts was made public on Dec. 25. It says: The DPRK and Japan inter-governmental vice department director-level contacts were made in Beijing on Dec. 24 and 25, 2005. Both sides had an exhaustive exchange of views on issues of mutual concern and confirmed the following points. 1. Both sides agreed to take measures to liquidate the unfortunate past and solve pending issues to normalize the relations between the two countries at an early date in the spirit of the DPRK-Japan Pyongyang Declaration and on the basic principle laid down in it. 2. They agreed to open talks within January 2006 by way of conducting three panel discussions on the issues of mutual concern with a view to improving the bilateral relations in all fields. 1) Both sides agreed to resume ambassador-level talks for the normalization of the bilateral relations at which they will hold earnest discussions on all the issues related to Japan's redemption of its past including the issue of economic cooperation, the issue of the status of the Koreans in Japan and the issue of return of cultural treasures, etc. 2) Both sides agreed to abide by the principle of discussing the issue of mutual security between the two sides on the sidelines of the six-party talks and hold a discussion at an appropriate level even before the resumption of the six-party talks. 3) Both sides agreed to discuss pending issues of mutual concern including the abduction issue.