Japan

2017
Return to Asian Geopolitics indexpage
Return to Japan indexpage

• December
• November
• October
• September
• August
• July
• June
• May
• April
• March
• February
• January

---

Return to top of page
DECEMBER 2017

• Moon Dismisses Sex Slavery Deal with Japan
  By Jeong Woo-sang, Kim Jin-myung December 29, 2017 10:42 President Moon Jae-in on Thursday said a controversial deal with Japan to compensate Korean wartime sex slaves is "seriously flawed" and "cannot settle" the dispute. In a statement read by Cheong Wa Dae spokesman Park Soo-hyun, Moon said, "It was an official agreement by both countries, but I have to reaffirm that the matter can't be settled like that." [Comfort women]
• Foreign ministers discuss sex slavery deal
  Posted : 2017-12-19 16:29 Updated : 2017-12-19 17:00 By Yi Whan-woo Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha sought Japan's understanding about an ongoing investigation by a Korean fact-finding team into a 2015 deal over "comfort women" during talks with her Japanese counterpart Taro Kono in Tokyo, Tuesday. Kang also expressed hope for improved relations between the two countries irrespective of the outcome of the probe. [Comfort women]
• Conflicting Japanese Responses to the Syrian Refugee Crisis
  Atsushi Yamagata December 14, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 24 | Number 2 Abstract This article explores Japanese responses to the Syrian refugee crisis since 2011. In particular, it examines the rationales of the Japanese government and others who expressed opinions on the crisis. Since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War in March 2011, a large number of civilians have been forced to flee their country of origin. Japan has been reluctant to accept refugees although it has pledged a large amount of financial assistance to international organizations. This article explores the rationales of Japanese responses as expressed in media texts and proceedings of the Diet and its committees, with a particular focus on issues of national identity and state identity. Keywords: Japan, Japanese refugee policy, the Syrian refugee crisis, identity, state identity, national identity [Refugee] [Racism]
• The Stakes of Historical Revisionism in Trump’s America: Teaching about the Comfort Women Atrocity in the Japanese Empire
  Miriam Kingsberg Kadia December 14, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 24 | Number 4 This is the first in what we hope will be an ongoing series devoted to teaching sensitive historical and contemporary issues in an era in which ‘trigger warnings’ and competing nationalisms shape educational experiences throughout the Asia-Pacific and the world. We invite contributions. The 2016 presidential campaign was hardly the starting point for surging neo-nationalism centered on a normative white male identity. Yet the election of Donald Trump reinforced certain links among racism, sexism, and neo-nationalism in the contemporary United States (and beyond). No less than the general public, universities across the nation have felt the impact of our forty-fifth president’s supremacist and exclusionary rhetoric. Many students, faculty, and staff reacted to last November’s results with shock and despair, while some felt acutely threatened by attacks on minorities, documented and undocumented immigrants, and other at-risk groups. In response, a number of universities have declared themselves “sanctuary campuses,” pledging to shield students and employees of uncertain immigration status. Many others, including the University of Colorado Boulder, where I teach, have issued statements of support for diversity and have mounted various formal and informal discussions of how to meaningfully support impacted members of the community. [Comfort women]
• The Shinzo and Vladimir Show set to Continue
  BY James d.j. Brown In one of the least surprising political events of the year, Vladimir Putin announced Dec. 6 that he would seek reelection as Russia’s president in March 2018. With Alexei Navalny, the anti-corruption campaigner, barred from running due to a dubious criminal conviction, Putin faces no real opposition and is all but assured of remaining Russian leader until 2024. In a more democratic but similarly uncompetitive election in October 2017, Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party scored a decisive victory that could enable Abe Shinzo to stay on as prime minister until late 2021. Were he to achieve this, Abe would become the longest serving prime minister in Japanese history. That these two powerful leaders may continue in office together for the next four years is viewed as a historic opportunity by some observers. It is hoped that Abe and Putin can use their domestic dominance and well-established personal ties to achieve a breakthrough in the countries’ longstanding territorial dispute. This relates to the status of the Southern Kurils (Northern Territories in Japan), four islands that were occupied by the Soviet Union at the end of World War II and whose contested status has prevented the signing of a peace treaty. [Putin Abe] [Russia Japan] [Missile defense] [US Japan alliance]
• Japan to buy missiles that can hit North Korea
  Posted : 2017-12-10 13:32 Updated : 2017-12-10 13:37 By Park Si-soo Japan plans to buy offensive air-to-surface missiles capable of striking North Korea. Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera announced the plan on Friday. Onodera said his ministry would request a special budget for the fiscal year starting April 2018 to buy the missiles, which are designed to be launched from military aircraft to hit targets on land or at sea. The move comes after North Korea tested a new type of intercontinental missile that landed in the sea within Japan's economic zone on Nov. 29. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has repeatedly called for Japan's weapon system to be reinforced for self-defense, saying the North's missile tests were an "imminent threat" to Japan and that talking to Pyongyang was "meaningless." "We are planning to introduce the JSM (Joint Strike Missile) that will be mounted on the F-35A (stealth fighter) as ‘standoff' missiles that can be fired beyond the range of enemy threats," Onodera said. The JSM, designed by Norway's Kongsberg Defence and Aerospace, has a range of 500 kilometers (310 miles) and the JASSM-ER can hit targets 1,000 kilometers away. Japan is also looking to mount Lockheed Martin's extended-range Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM-ER) on its F-15 fighters, according to Japanese media. The plan instantly sparked controversy because the purchase could be seen as a step against Japan's post-World War II pacifist Constitution that bans the use of force as a way to settle international disputes. The defense minister denied the allegations, saying the missiles would be for defense and Japan would rely on the United States to strike foreign countries. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• The War on Games
  Sabine Frühstück November 20, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 23 | Number 5 2017 and talk of war games is all around us. When The New York Times reported on 10 July of this year that India, the U.S. and Japan had begun “war games,” surely very few readers thought of these war games as actual games. After all, they were designed to have submarines slide unannounced into the deep waters of the Indian Ocean in order to silently take positions near the Indian coastline. When, about a month later, according to The People’s Liberation Army Daily China’s army commanders declared that the mobile phone game Honor of Kings endangered national defense, they were not joking either. They appeared convinced that the game had infiltrated soldiers’ and officers’ daily lives and that their addiction to the game would undermine their combat readiness.1 Around the world, many similar, and often contradictory pronouncements are made daily. Roll back about one hundred years. Until the end of the Asia-Pacific War, in Japan at least, “war games” or “heitai gokko” more often than not referred to a range of war games played by children. In such games and pictures, Here, I tell the story of how Japanese children learned to conceive of war as play and how, in the words of a war game manual of 1913, “children’s little wars” connected and interacted with the “grand game”—a term that over the years has referred to both the annual grand maneuvers of the Imperial Army and Japan’s wars in Asia. I describe various modalities of and debates about children’s war play and its rules and regularities in the hills and along the rivers of nineteenth-century rural Japan to the killing fields of the twentieth century. Throughout, children’s war games have shared the qualities of instruction, training, and disciplining, thus embodying the modern notion of “continuous war” that has dramatically gained currency with the centralization of the power to make war, the rise of the nation-state, and the simultaneous marginalization of war to national borders. [Japan] [Militarisation] [History]
• Tokyo to Conduct Nuke Evacuation Drills from Next Year
  By Kim Deok-han, Kim Soo-hye December 04, 2017 10:19 Tokyo will conduct nuclear evacuation drills to prepare for nuclear and missile attacks from North Korea from next year. The Japanese government plans to conduct evacuation drills for residents in central Tokyo between January and March next year to prepare for a ballistic missile attack, the Sankei Shimbun reported Sunday. This will be the first time a highly populated metropolitan area like Tokyo conducts such a drill because the Japanese government has so far avoided alarming the populace unnecessarily. [Hysteria] [Japanese remilitarisation]

---

Return to top of page
NOVEMBER 2017

• Asian-American judges work to build international solidarity on comfort women issue
  Posted on : Nov.19,2017 18:37 KST Modified on : Nov.19,2017 18:37 KST Lillian Sing and Julie Tang, who founded the multi-ethnic Comfort Women Justice Coalition, pose for a photo outside the Hankyoreh headquarters in the Mapo District of Seoul on Nov. 13. The comfort women issue “has been so demonstrably proven by scholars that there is no further need for evidence,” said Sing. (by Shin So-young, staff photographer) “Japan is actively denying its history” by refusing to address the subject Lillian Sing and Julie Tang are judges in the American state of California. They retired from their positions after serving for 30 and 26 years, respectively. Tang submitted her resignation in 2014, and Sing in 2015. Sing is also the first Asian-American female judge in Northern California. “I didn’t want to leave my position as judge. I love working as a judge. [Quitting my job] was a big sacrifice for me,” Sing said. In the US, federal judges are appointed for life, but state judges serve on renewable six-year contracts. Sing quit her job one day before a public hearing at the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. The hearing was being held to adopt a resolution to set up a memorial statue to the comfort women. After the hearing, which featured testimony by former comfort woman Lee Yong-su, among others, the resolution passed the city council unanimously in Sept. 2015. “I thought it wouldn’t be appropriate for a sitting judge to make public remarks at the hearing,” Sing said. [Comfort women]
• Tokyo Furious Over Korean State Dinner for Trump
  November 09, 2017 12:30 A set of dishes served U.S. President Donald Trump during a state dinner at Cheong Wa Dae in Seoul on Tuesday /Courtesy of Cheong Wa Dae The rightwing government in Tokyo was duly incensed when Korea served U.S. President Donald Trump shrimp caught near Korea's easternmost islets of Dokdo, to which Japan maintains a flimsy colonial claim. Worse in the eyes of the nationalists in Japan was the invitation to a state dinner for Trump on Tuesday of a victim of imperial Japan's sexual enslavement of women during World War II. Tokyo protested through diplomatic channels that Cheong Wa Dae's invitation of sex slavery victim Lee Yong-soo to the state dinner is "against the purport" of a 2015 agreement to compensate the women, which was once described as "a final and irreversible resolution," according to the Yomiuri Shimbun on Wednesday. [Trump] [Asia Visit 1711] [SK Japan] [US dominance]
• Abe reiterates hardline on North Korea while Trump tones down rhetoric
  Posted on : Nov.7,2017 15:55 KST Modified on : Nov.7,2017 15:55 KST US President Donald Trump and Japanese Prime Minsiter Shinzo Abe meet with Hitomi Soga, Megumi Yokota, and other family members of Japanese abductees of North Korea at the State Guest House following the two leaders’ summit on Nov. 6. (AFP/Yonhap News) The two leaders met with family members of Japanese abductees following their summit During the joint press conference that followed his summit meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Nov. 6, US President Donald Trump appeared to tone down his rhetoric, defying expectations by only repeating his standard position on North Korea and its nuclear program. For the most part, it was only Abe who made remarks expressing a hardline stance on the North. While the American and Japanese leaders have been highlighting their warm relations, on this day they displayed a difference of intention on the North Korean solution. [Abe Shinzo] [Trump] [Rhetoric] [Abductees] [Asia visit1711]
• Trump pushes US weapons on Japan during last day of visit
  Posted on : Nov.7,2017 15:50 KST Modified on : Nov.7,2017 15:50 KST The US President also criticized trade relations between the two countries, calling them “unfair” US President Donald Trump explicitly demanded the purchase of US weaponry during a joint press conference after Nov. 6 summit with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. In the press conference, Trump said Abe would be able to shoot down North Korean missiles “when he completes the purchase of lots of additional military equipment from the United States.” Trump also demanded action to correct the trade imbalance between the US and Japan, calling the current trade situation “unfair.” The remarks are seen as foreshadowing pressure to come on trade and weapons purchasing when Trump visits South Korea on Nov. 7. [Trump] [Japanese remilitarisation] [Arms sales] [Asia visit1711]
• Trump questions why Japan didn’t shoot down North Korean ICBMs
  Posted on : Nov.6,2017 16:41 KST Modified on : Nov.6,2017 16:41 KST US President Donald Trump plays a round of golf with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and the fourth-ranked golfer in the world, Hideki Matsuyama, at the Kasumigaseki Golf Club outside of Tokyo on Nov. 5. (AFP/Yonhap News) Two NK missiles passed over Hokkaido in recent months US President Donald Trump complained that Japan should have shot down missiles test-launched by North Korea, Kyodo News reported on Nov. 5. In its report, the news agency quoted numerous anonymous diplomatic sources as saying Trump had made the remarks in meetings and telephone conversations with the leaders of Southeast Asian countries on Nov. 8–10. Trump reportedly asked why Japan “didn’t shoot down a missile that was passing through its airspace,” expressing bafflement that a “warrior nation” like Japan did not take the action. North Korea test-launched ballistic missiles that passed through Japanese airspace over Hokkaido on Aug. 29 and Sept. 15. At the time, the Japanese government said it did not shoot them down because it determined the warheads would not fall on Japanese territory. Analysts have suggested that Japan did not attempt to shoot down the North Korean missiles because of the potential for legal controversy and the technological difficulty of an interception. The North Korean missiles reached maximum altitudes of 550 km while passing over Hokkaido – far beyond the airspace limit, but not high enough to prevent interception with the Patriot missiles or Aegis SM3 interception missiles possessed by Japan. [Hwasong-12] [Interception] [Japan] [Legality] [Media] [Efficacy]
• For Families of Japanese Abducted by North Korea, Trump Visit Brings Spotlight
  By Motoko Rich Nov. 3, 2017 TOKYO — Their stories are wrenching narratives of normalcy interrupted: the young couple taken while on a date at the beach, the single mother snatched on her way to pick up her toddlers after work, and the teenager who never made it home from badminton practice. Four decades ago, according to the Japanese government, at least 17 Japanese citizens vanished at the hands of North Korea, leaving their families with precious little information. North Korea has acknowledged only that its agents abducted 13 Japanese in the 1970s and ’80s. Five of them were returned home in 2002; North Korea has said the rest died long ago. [Abductees] [Manipulation] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• The Philippines-Japan security partnership in a changing regional security environment
  by Lucio Blanco Pitlo III and Mico A. Galang Lucio Blanco Pitlo III (lucioatacup@rocketmail.com) is a lecturer at the Ateneo de Manila University’s School of Social Sciences and board member of the Philippine Association for Chinese Studies. Mico A. Galang is a defense researcher at the National Defense College of the Philippines (NDCP). The views expressed by the authors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the official positions of their affiliations. In the wake of US President Donald Trump’s calls for allies to contribute more to shoulder the regional security burden, the spotlight has fallen on Japan, the key US ally in the Asia-Pacific. The world’s third largest economy possesses the most capable defense force within the US-led regional security umbrella. As such, there is an expectation that, with US encouragement, Japan can play a greater role as security partner for less militarily capable countries in Southeast Asia. This expectation assumes new weight as Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, a champion of Japan’s security “normalization” and a higher regional and global security profile, was given a new mandate in last month’s elections. Japan has expressed keen interest in partnering with the Philippines on security issues. Both the Philippines and Japan are archipelagic coastal states with longstanding security ties to the US and shared maritime interests and issues. Should the US regional security commitment wither or become hostage to Trump’s transactional approach (particularly in regard to China), Japan may fill the gap, although that prospect is not without challenges. There are many opportunities for enhanced Philippine-Japan security cooperation. [Japan Philippines] [Japanese remilitarisation] [China confrontation]
• UNESCO postpones registration of comfort women archival materials due to pressure from Japanese government
  Posted on : Nov.1,2017 17:46 KST Modified on : Nov.1,2017 17:46 KST The committee said the decision reflected the ongoing disagreement between interested parties UNESCO has decided to postpone Memory of the World registration of archival materials on comfort women. The decision, which means a victory for Japan, was welcomed by Tokyo as “appropriate.” UNESCO’s International Advisory Committee, which makes decisions on the Memory of the World register, opted to recommend postponement of the comfort women archival material registration in a list of registration recommendations announced on Oct. 30 in Paris. The recommendation was approved by UNESCO director-general Irina Bokova. [Comfort women] [UNESCO] [UNUS]
• Japanese expert: Military alliance with US remains the only option for Japan
  Posted on : Oct.31,2017 17:25 KST Modified on : Oct.31,2017 17:25 KST Toshihiro Nakayama, a professor of American politics and foreign policy at Keio University, speaks during a meeting with foreign correspondents at the Foreign Press Center in Tokyo on Oct. 30. Toshihiro Nakayama gives Prime Minister Abe high marks for his handling of Trump administration The US-Japan alliance is Japan’s best option – and indeed, its only option, according to a Japanese expert on American politics. Toshihiro Nakayama, a professor of American politics and foreign policy at Keio University, made the remarks during a meeting with foreign correspondents held at the Foreign Press Center in Tokyo on Oct. 30, on the eve of US President Donald Trump’s to visit Japan. Nakayama frequently appears as an expert on US-Japan relations on NHK and other major Japanese media outlets, and his remarks reflect the mainstream Japanese sentiment toward US-Japan relations. [US Japan Alliance] [MISCOM]

---

Return to top of page
OCTOBER 2017

• Abe Pulls It Off, But It Will End In Tears
  Abe Shinzo’s victory in the election will only propel Japan down the dead end road of remilitarization
  By Tim Beal Oct 24, 2017 Snap election – harnessing hysteria, diverting attention Japanese Prime Minister’s gamble in calling a snap election to harness anxiety and hysteria over the much-publicized ‘threat from North Korea’ has succeeded, as it was widely predicted. The political achievement is considerable. Only a couple of months back, things were not looking good for Abe and his Liberal Democratic Party. The New York Times described the ‘Abe conundrum’: Mr. Abe’s public approval ratings dipped below 30 percent over the summer as he was dogged by a series of scandals, and opinion polls taken during the campaign found that more voters disapproved of Mr. Abe’s hawkish strategy toward North Korea than approved of it. “There is an Abe conundrum,” Professor Kingston [the director of Asian studies at Temple University in Tokyo] said. “How does a guy who is basically unpopular with voters, whose policies are not particularly popular, who doesn’t get high marks for leadership, and yet he keeps winning in elections?” He had a little bit of luck – a typhoon kept some voters away, and the opposition was fractured– but his winning card was the hysteria over North Korea after the recent tests of the Hwasong-12 missile that overflew Japan. Electors might not have approved of Abe’s North Korea policy or his plans for remilitarization, but it appears that he frightened a sufficient number. [Abe Shinzo] [Election] [Hysteria] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• [Editorial] Abe likely to push for constitutional changes after landslide victory
  Posted on : Oct.24,2017 18:18 KST Modified on : Oct.24,2017 18:18 KST A coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and Komeito Party led by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe won a huge victory in an Oct. 22 snap general election for Japan’s House of Representatives. The ruling coalition won 313 seats (284 for LDP, 29 for junior partner Komeito), giving it more than a two-thirds majority (310) and putting it over the line needed to propose a Constitutional amendment. Abe now looks set to attempt the amendment of Japan’s Constitution that has been his lifelong mission – namely overturning the Peace Constitution system and enabling Japan to wage war. Rearmament of Japan, a country guilty of war crimes in the past, could end up another factor generating intense objections from China and South Korea and raising tensions in Northeast Asia. [Abe Shinzo] [Election] [Japanese remiltarisation] [Constitution] [Sidelined]
• Japan: Hopeless?
  October 25, 2017 For one brief moment last month, it appeared that Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo had lost his touch. The man who had won four consecutive landslide national election victories –and who would soon make it five – was eclipsed by his nemesis, Tokyo Gov. Koike Yoriko, who launched a new political party, Kibo no To (Party of Hope) hours before Abe called a snap election to be held on Oct. 22. The commentariat was aflutter over the new party and the prospect, finally, of a real challenger to Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). After the brief flurry of excitement, hopes for Hope were dashed. Koike’s decision to remain governor, her managerial style, and the party’s conservative orientation all undermined its electoral prospects. Kibo no To may yet prove to be a milestone in Japanese politics, but not as intended: Koike’s determination to ensure that her party is ideologically pure may help sort Japanese politicians in ways that promote the competition of ideas that has long eluded the nation’s politics. Abe called the snap election to claim a mandate for difficult economic policy decisions – a long delayed jump in the consumption tax – and the commencement of a national dialogue on constitutional reform. To do so, he sought to capitalize on six straight quarters of growth, a disorganized and dispirited opposition – its main component, the Democratic Party (DP), was falling apart – and a recovery in his Cabinet’s popularity, both of which he would use to grow his parliamentary majority and ensure his occupancy of the Prime Minister’s Office until the Tokyo Olympics in 2020, which would be his valedictory moment. [Abe Shinzo] [Election] [Koike Yoriko]
• [Interview] Mike Honda speaks about publicizing comfort women issue in the US
  Former US Congressman Mike Honda (left) and Russell Lowe, the Secretary General of the Education for Social Justice Foundation, spoke about their efforts to publicize the comfort women issue in the United States during a visit to the Hankyoreh’s office in the Gongdeok neighborhood of Seoul on Oct. 15. (by Kim Jeong-hyo, staff photographer) The former congressman has been at the forefront of efforts to raise awareness among the American public “I think the Abe administration’s policies and Abe’s remarks themselves are evidence of anti-intellectualism. They say there’s no [corroborating] evidence, but since there are obviously documents showing that the Japanese government systematically mobilized and kidnapped women, the Japanese government ought to take responsibility. That’s why the Kono Statement was released. It’s not so much that there’s insufficient evidence as that there’s a lack of moral leadership in the current Japanese government,” said former US Congressman Michael Honda, 76. Honda dismisses as “nonsense” the claims of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and the Japanese government that there was nothing compulsory about the mobilization of the comfort women for the Japanese Imperial army. Also present at the interview was Russell Lowe, 62, Secretary General of the Education for Social Justice Foundation, a San Francisco-based civic group, who agreed with Honda’s view. This is how Lowe put it: “It’s not true that there aren’t any documents. One of the problems is that these documents aren’t able to be disseminated in American society because they’re written in Chinese, Japanese and Korean. That’s why one of the priorities of our foundation’s educational efforts is properly communicating the facts about the comfort women in American society.” [Comfort women]
• Moon Congratulates Abe on Election Victory
  October 25, 2017 09:48 President Moon Jae-in on Tuesday congratulated Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on his party's victory in general elections, according to Cheong Wa Dae. It quoted Moon as saying Abe’s four consecutive victories "show the Japanese people's firm support and trust in your policies, vision, and leadership." Abe told Moon he recovered from fatigue with some Korean food on the last day of the election campaign and pledged to work closely with him in the future. [Moon Jae-in] [Abe Shinzo] [Election]
• Abe sweeps to victory in Japan vote
  Posted : 2017-10-23 01:05 Updated : 2017-10-23 01:05 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wears off earphone as he attends at headquarters of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party in Tokyo, Japan, Oct. 22, after close of vote of the Lower House election. / EPA-Yonhap By Ko Dong-hwan Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe swept to a victory in a snap election Sunday and vowed to "deal firmly" with threats from North Korea that dominated the campaign. Abe's conservative coalition was on road to win 311 seats in the 465-seat parliament, according to a projection from private broadcaster TBS, possibly making him Japan's longest-serving leader. The election win is likely to stiffen Abe's resolve to tackle North Korea's nuclear threat, as Japan, the key U.S. regional ally, seeks to exert strong pressure on Pyongyang after it fired two missiles over Japan in the space of a month. [Abe Shinzo] [Election] [Hysteria]
• Installation of comfort woman statue delayed at US university
  Posted on : Oct.19,2017 17:34 KST Modified on : Oct.19,2017 17:34 KST Comfort woman survivor Gil Won-ok speaks during a press conference at the Korean American Association of the Washington Metropolitan Area on Oct. 17. At left is Yoon Mee-hwang, co-director of the Korean Council for Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan and on the right is Kim Young-cheon, the chairwoman of the KAAWMA. Salisbury University will host survivor Gil Won-ok to give a lecture about her experience The installation of a comfort woman statue at Salisbury University in Maryland has been indefinitely postponed from its scheduled date on Oct. 19. Despite the postponement, comfort woman survivor Gil Won-ok, 90, plans to visit the university the same day to deliver a talk to students and members of the public on the comfort women’s painful experiences. Speaking at a press conference held on Oct. 17 in the offices of the Korean American Association of Washington Metropolitan Area (KAAWMA) in Annandale, Virginia, and attended by Gil, Secretary-General Jae-su Lee of the Washington Comfort Women Statue Committee announced that he had received word from the university about the indefinite postponement late last month. The Salisbury statue’s installment had been pursued in secrecy, out of concerns that its symbolic value as the first such statue in the Washington metropolitan area might invite outside interference.
  While he said that “nothing has been confirmed,” Lee explained, “Given a similar situation that occurred last year in Sydney, Australia, we suspect there may have been pressure from Japan.” [Comfort women] [Sidelined]
• Backstory to Abe’s Snap Election – the Secrets of Moritomo, Kake and the “Missing” Japan SDF Activity Logs
  Lawrence Repeta October 15, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 20 | Number 6 Prime Minister Abe Shinzo announced his call for national elections on Monday, September 25. News reports explained that he deemed the timing right due to a recent bounce in public support triggered by threats from North Korea and by the severe weakness of the political opposition.1 Abe was especially eager to strike before Tokyo Governor Koike Yuriko had time to organize a strong national party. By acting decisively to win the October 22 election, he would secure another four years of LDP power. But there is another reason for Abe’s timing that has received less attention in the international press. Throughout 2017, the Prime Minister has been dogged by a series of cases that exposed government malfeasance. Repeated revelations of government wrongdoing involving cronyism and willful concealment and destruction of potentially embarrassing public records had taken a toll on Abe’s popularity. Surely, he feared that with the opening of a new Diet session, investigations of cases like these would again reveal the unpleasant underside of Abe’s great power and lead to declining support levels and perhaps calls for him to step down. The clever Abe was able to sidestep all this. By calling the “snap election” he shut down the Diet, sidelined the investigations, and shifted the people’s focus to other issues. [Abe Shinzo] [Corruption] [Cronyism] [Threat] [Hysteria] [Election]
• Public Statuary and Nationalism in Modern and Contemporary Japan
  Sven Saaler October 15, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 20 | Number 3 Introduction In recent years we have seen a worldwide increase in debates surrounding memorials that celebrate historical personalities. In the United States, statues of generals who commanded the troops of the Confederacy in the Civil War (1861-65) have been demolished or strongly criticized as inappropriate. In Oxford, students have demanded the removal of a statue of Cecil Rhodes (1853-1902) because of the role he played in British imperialism and his advocacy of racist ideology, which is today widely considered offensive. In 2015, the University of Cape Town removed a statue of Rhodes, which had been erected in 1934 near the entrance to the campus. In Namibia, the statue of a German colonial soldier was demolished in 2009 and later re-erected at a less prominent position, only narrowly escaping complete destruction.1 In some cases, the controversies around these monuments have led to violent clashes between those who consider them remnants of a former age, out of sympathy with the twenty-first century zeitgeist, and those who either favor their preservation as part of the country’s “culture and heritage” or who continue to espouse the ideologies the statues represent. In Japan, heated controversies over public statues and the historical roles played by the personalities they represented were common in the prewar and in the immediate postwar era. Today, however, such debates are rather muted, suggesting a low degree of historical awareness in contemporary society. This article examines earlier controversies and explains the reasons for postwar public silence over public statues [Nationalism]
• Former US Congressman awarded honorary doctorate from Cheongju University
  Posted on : Oct.15,2017 13:07 KST Modified on : Oct.15,2017 13:07 KST Former US Congressman Mike Honda (D-California) gives a special lecture to Cheongju University students after receiving an honorary doctorate from the university on Oct. 13 (by Oh Yoon-joo, Cheongju correspondent) Mike Honda was recognized for passing legislation on the comfort women issue in the US House of Representatives Mike Honda, a former US Congressman who spearheaded the passage of a resolution to address the Korean comfort women issue while serving in the House of Representatives, received an honorary doctoral degree in political science from Cheongju University on Oct. 13. [Comfort women]
• Abe doubles down on Kim, but will his snap election gamble pay off?
  With North Korean missiles flying overhead, voters may have bigger concerns than a stagnant economy and kindergarten shortages By Julian Ryall 1 Oct 2017 Love him or loathe him, there is no denying that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is a consummate politician who has sensed that public sentiment is sufficiently with him that he will once again win a general election. And while the electorate may express concern about a stagnant economy, shortages of places at kindergartens or any number of quibbles about everyday life, there is one issue that largely binds Japan’s voters together. Abe will fend off all-comers at the general election on October 22 because the average Japanese is genuinely fearful of an unpredictable but increasingly belligerent North Korea. Extensive media coverage – often more than a little alarmist – has convinced the public that Abe is the only political leader sufficiently resolute and experienced to handle a regime that has nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles and – possibly – the will to use them. [Abe Shinzo] [Threat] [Election] [Hysteria]
• The Japan-US relationship: How strong is the glue?
  In Japan questions are being asked about possible ‘de-coupling’ of the Japan-US defense relationship if Tokyo seeks an independent nuclear capability By Grant Newsham October 6, 2017 The Japan-US relationship – like most nation-to-nation ties – is strongest when it’s unstressed and North Korea’s push for atomic weapons offers plenty of stress. One result of this is talk in Tokyo on whether Japan should develop its own nuclear arsenal instead of relying on America’s. It is also a reminder that Tokyo has long had doubts – even if never stated too loudly – about America’s commitment to defending Japan. And in Japan questions are being asked about possible ‘de-coupling’ of the Japan-US defense relationship if Tokyo seeks an independent nuclear capability. But it’s also possible Japan might decide it doesn’t need the relationship at all. Although the 65-year-old alliance is still sound enough, it’s not unbreakable – especially now that threats to Japan are no longer academic as they mostly were until a decade ago. [US Japan alliance] [Nuclearisation]

---

Return to top of page
SEPTEMBER 2017

• This island is ours: Defending Dokdo/Reclaiming Takeshima
  Date: Thursday, 5 October, 2017 Time: 5.30pm Cost: Free Location: Te Ahumairangi (ground floor), National Library, corner Molesworth and Aitken Streets Contact Details: For more information, email events.natlib@dia.govt.nz A documentary collaboration between Alexander Bukh and Nils Clauss Alexander Bukh, a scholar of international relations of Northeast Asia, and Nils Clauss, a Seoul based professional filmmaker, bring you this examination of territorial disputes and civic activism in Northeast Asia. The territorial controversy between Japan and Korea over the ownership of Dokdo/Takeshima islets resurfaced in the early 2000s and today is one of the major stumbling blocks in bilateral relations. The controversy, however, is not limited to state to state relations as in both countries there are citizens' groups actively engaged in protesting, lobbying and educating the public. [Territorial disputes] [Dokdo]
• Japan’s Abe calls snap election amid worries over North Korea
  Political analysts are not ruling out a "nasty surprise" for the Japanese leader, considering recent so-called populist revolts in other countries By Linda Sieg September 25, 2017 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he would dissolve parliament’s lower house on Thursday for a snap election, as he seeks a fresh mandate to overcome “a national crisis”. Abe, in power for five years, said he needed a mandate to shift some revenues from a planned future tax hike to social spending such as education, besides seeking support for a tough stance toward North Korea’s repeated missile and nuclear tests. "I will dissolve the lower house on September 28,” Abe told a nationally televised news conference on Monday. Earlier, the head of Abe’s junior coalition partner, Natsuo Yamaguchi, said he understood the election would be held on Oct. 22. The decision is largely seen as aimed at taking advantage of Abe’s recently improved support ratings and opposition disarray. [Abe Shinzo] [Hysteria] [Election] [Threat]
• Japan’s prime minister, enjoying a sudden bounce in polls, is set to call a snap election
  President Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe (left) toast during a luncheon at the United Nations in New York. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters) By Anna Fifield September 22 at 3:19 AM TOKYO — Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has one person to thank for reviving his political fortunes, and it’s a surprising person: Kim Jong Un. Just two months ago, Abe was mired in scandal and his poll ratings were falling so precipitously that analysts were ready to write the 62-year-old’s political obituary. Then the North Korean leader started firing missiles over Japan and suddenly the hardline Abe was looking like just the prime minister Japan needed again. “Kim Jong Un is doing him a great favor,” said Jeff Kingston, director of Asia studies at Temple University’s campus in Japan. “During crises like this, there is a rally around the flag and that helps the LDP, which is seen as strong on security,” he said, referring to Abe’s conservative Liberal Democratic Party. Abe is expected to announce Monday that he is dissolving the lower house of the Diet, or parliament, and calling a snap election for Oct. 22, 14 months ahead of schedule. [Abe Shinzo] [Threat] [Hysteria] [Election]
• Abe’s India visit: cementing bilateral ties and defining the Indo-Pacific order
  by Prateek Joshi Prateek Joshi (prat.josh2812@gmail.com) is a researcher on Asia’s geostrategic issues. Barely three weeks after India and China agreed to disengage from the Doklam region, (the site of 10-week border standoff), Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo arrived in India for the 12th Indo-Japan Summit, a clear signal of the dynamism behind Asian balance of power politics. In addition to the China factor, Abe’s two-day visit has been interpreted as an aggressive projection of India’s Act East policy, wherein the issues of strategic partnership, geopolitics, and technological cooperation will be outlined with a goal to chart a shared vision of Asian order driven by the foundational desire to challenge Chinese might. With time, India-Japan ties have crossed “mere” bilateralism and appear to be moving toward creation of a niche in global order, as both attempt to influence the Indo-Pacific theater. India refused to endorse or attend the Belt and Road Forum in Beijing in May, not just because of its opposition to the China Pakistan Economic Corridor passing through Indian-claimed territory but also because New Delhi views China’s growing economic footprint in Asia as a blatant attempt to create Asia-wide patron-client relations and it sees Japan as a natural partner to devise a strategy to counter the OBOR. [China confrontation] [India Japan] [Counterbalance]
• Document Shows Japanese Gov't's Role in Recruiting Sex Slaves
  September 20, 2017 12:13 An official Japanese government document proves Tokyo's involvement in the forced mobilization of Korean women as sex slaves for Japanese soldiers during World War II. Prof. Yuji Hosaka, who heads the Dokdo Research Institute at Sejong University, told reporters on Tuesday, "The Japanese government provided accommodation and support in the process of organizing comfort women," using the Japanese euphemism for the sex slaves. Hosaka translated the document from the archives of the Asian Women's Fund set up by the Japanese government in 1994 to compensate the victims. The Imperial Army fell under the direct control of the emperor and wielded tremendous power, and the Japanese government followed its orders. [Comfort women]
• [Reporter’s notebook] Vestiges of forced labor still remain on Jeju Island
  Posted on : Sep.16,2017 10:26 KST Modified on : Sep.16,2017 10:26 KST During World War II, the Japanese military launched bombing attacks on Nanjing, China from Altteureu airfield outside of Seogwipo City on Jeju Island. The old control tower, an aircraft hangar, and anti-aircraft emplacements are still visible at the historic site. Sanbang Mountain and Halla Mountain can be seen in the background. (Kim Myoung-jin, staff photographer) Long-time residents recount toiling on Japanese defense projects during World War II “My father, my big brother, and I went to Altteureu together and dug caves on Songak Mountain, sleeping at a hamba (a Japanese term for a makeshift dormitory for laborers). When I was 15, I was doing tough pickaxe work and I got a bad injury to my forehead.” This was how the late Kim Seong-bang related his experience a decade or so ago when I was doing a story on people forcibly mobilized for labor during the Japanese occupation. Then 77 years old, the resident of Jeju’s Hallim township still bore the scar on his forehead. “Altteureu” is the name of the area around Songak Mountain in the Daejeong township of Seogwipo City on Jeju Island. Its name is a combination of the Jeju dialect words “al,” meaning “lower,” and “deureu,” meaning “field.” A broad expanse of farmland by the coast, it is one of the best remaining examples of the vestiges of war and the ambitions of the Japanese empire’s war of conquest. The empire used it as an air base for Chinese bombing during the Sino-Japanese War that began in 1937; in the later stages of the Pacific War, it built various military facilities there, including an airfield to block the US advance on the Japanese mainland. As part of this process, Jeju residents were drafted on a permanent basis to build airfields, hardened sites, and bunkers as well as make other war preparations. Whole families were occasionally mobilized, as in Kim’s case, and residents sometimes served by proxy, such as young children substituting for fathers who had to do farming. In one case, three brothers were drafted into military or labor service at different sites in Japan and on Jeju Island. Often, laborers were injured when hangars collapsed during construction or the roof caved in while a hardened site was being excavated. [Japanese colonialism]
• Comfort women continue long quest for justice
  Posted on : Sep.14,2017 18:01 KST Modified on : Sep.14,2017 18:01 KST Former Japanese comfort women Kim Bok-dong (L) and Gil Won-ok take part in a demonstration outside the former Japanese embassy building in Seoul’s Junghak neighborhood on Sept. 13. Next to them are boxes containing the signatures of people worldwide who are supporting the “100 million global citizen campaign” to demand apology from the Japanese government and restitution for the women. Group marks 1,300th weekly protest outside of former Japanese embassy What began as a lonely protest on Jan. 8, 1992, marked its 1,300th event on Sept. 13. Attended by around 300 people, the occasion included a dance routine by sixth grade elementary school students and chants by other students in uniform. It was the 1,300th of the weekly Wednesday demonstrations for a resolution to the Japanese military sexual slavery issue, an event held every Wednesday afternoon across from the former Japanese embassy building in Seoul’s Junghak neighborhood. The Japanese military comfort women survivors’ calls for the Japanese government to acknowledge criminal actions and provide lawful compensation remain unanswered. “Things reached the point where the [Shinzo] Abe and Park Geun-hye administrations negotiated a free pass [for Japan] in 2015 without any proper apology and with a one billion yen (US$9.1 million) ‘contribution’ of uncertain identity instead of lawful compensation,” the group Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan (Jeongdaehyeop) said on Sept. 13. “Despite listing renegotiation and nullification of the South Korea-Japan [comfort women] agreement as one of its campaign pledges, the Moon Jae-in administration has not taken any action after four months in office,” the group said” [Comfort women] [Moon Jae-in] [Tragedy]
• Tokyo court rules against pro-North Korean high school
  Posted on : Sep.14,2017 18:03 KST Modified on : Sep.14,2017 18:03 KST Attorneys for a group of Chosen Gakko students hold signs reading “Unfair judgment” and “The students voices aren’t behind heard” outside of the Tokyo District Court after a ruling was issued allowing the government to deny subsidies to the pro-North Korean school on Sept 13. The ruling upholds government’s decision to strip funding from “Chosen Gakko” “How much more do we have to scream? Our voices have been stolen. Can you hear us? Are you listening?” On the afternoon of Sept. 13, a group of Korean-Japanese in front of the Tokyo District Court in Kasumigaseki, a Tokyo neighborhood that houses many government offices, were chanting a song called “Let the Voices Gather, Let the Songs Come,” which contains a mixture of Japanese and Korean words. This was the day when the Tokyo District Court was scheduled to make a decision on the legality of the Japanese government’s decision to exclude a “Chosen Gakko” (pro-North Korean school) from a government program to provide free high school education. [Zainichi] [Racism] [Discrimination] [Anti-Korean]
• 'Cockroaches' and 'old hags': hounding of the North Korean diaspora in Japan
  Japan has 600,000 Korean residents, many descended from forced wartime labourers. While 150,000 claim loyalty to Pyongyang, all face hostility because of the regime’s behaviour A police officer at the pro-Pyongyang General Association of Korean Residents in Japan building. There are fears of protests and violence from people angry after a North Korean missile flew over Japan. A police officer at the pro-Pyongyang General Association of Korean Residents in Japan building. There are fears of protests and violence from people angry after a North Korean missile flew over Japan. Photograph: Aflo/REX/Shutterstock Justin McCurry in Osaka Saturday 2 September 2017 03.02 BST Last modified on Saturday 2 September 2017 11.45 BST As a Korean resident of Japan, Lee Sinhae knows only too well how quickly, and cruelly, political tensions find expression in personal abuse. The freelance writer has acquired an unwanted public profile after winning a court case last year against the extremist group Zaitokukai for defamation. Its former leader, Makoto Sakurai, had called Lee a “Korean old hag” online and during street demonstrations. “Zaitokukai members even told me to get out of Japan and go back to Korea, even though I was born here,” said Lee. Now, after North Korea dramatically raised tensions across the region with tests of intercontinental ballistic missiles and Tuesday’s missile launch over the Japanese island of Hokkaido, tens of thousands of Korean residents of Japan with family connections to the North fear becoming the innocent victims of growing Japanese hostility towards Pyongyang. [Zainichi] [Racism]
• Kim Jong-un's Crazy Summer: A Litmus Test for Japan
  North Korea’s active summer poses a host of challenges to Japan’s defense posture. By Titli Basu September 02, 2017 The summer of 2017, especially August, has been an eventful season for Japan. With the backdrop of escalating regional tensions on the Korean Peninsula in addition to the PLA’s 90th anniversary celebrations underscoring China’s massive military modernization, Tokyo’s defense establishment has a number of serious concerns to manage. North Korea’s latest ballistic missile flying over Cape Erimo and Oshima Peninsula (Hokkaido) on August 29 is a game-changer. Several other important developments took shape in August: Japan’s new defense minister, Itsunori Onodera, took charge on August 3 after months of controversy which had diluted public confidence and culminated in the resignation of the country’s top defense leadership; publication of the annual defense white paper on August 8 with the backdrop of “strong concerns” sparked by “a new level” of threat from North Korean ballistic missiles and “intimidating activities in the East and South China Seas” driven by Chinese maritime expansion; manifestation of North Korean threats vis-à-vis Guam and the deployment of PAC-3 missiles to four bases in the west including in Kochi (Kochi prefecture), Izumo (Shimane prefecture), Kaitaichi (Hiroshima prefecture), and Matsuyama (Ehime Prefecture) on August 12; the hosting of the U.S.-Japan Security Consultative Committee meeting (Japan-U.S. 2+2) after a hiatus of two years on August 17; defense ministry seeking a $48.2 billion defense budget for fiscal 2018, representing a 2.5 percent increase year-on-year; and the short-range missile launch by Pyongyang on August 26 following the anniversary of Songun Chongch’i or military-first policy initiated by North Korean leader Kim Jong-il. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Threat]
• Moon, Abe discuss joint response to North Korean missile launch during phone call
  Posted on : Aug.31,2017 16:48 KST Modified on : Aug.31,2017 16:48 KST President Moon Jae-in discusses the recent North Korean missile launch during a phone call with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Aug. 30. (provided by Blue House) Two leaders affirm support for further UN sanctions against Pyongyang South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe agreed in a telephone conversation on Aug. 30 to raise pressure on Pyongyang “to the extreme” so that it “takes the first step toward dialogue.” The conversation came one day after a North Korean-launched ballistic missile passed through Japanese airspace. Blue House spokesperson Park Soo-hyun explained that the two leaders “had a 25-minute telephone conversation at 9:30 this morning in which they agreed to pursue a UN Security Council sanctions resolution with more concrete and effective countermeasures against North Korea, and to spearhead South Korea-US-Japan discussions in the process while working together to solicit cooperation from China and Russia.”

---

Return to top of page
AUGUST 2017

• Moon, Abe agree 'extreme' pressure on North Korea
  Posted : 2017-08-30 16:39 Updated : 2017-08-30 21:45 By Kim Rahn President Moon Jae-in President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe have agreed that the international community needs to increase pressure on North Korea to an "extreme" level, following Tuesday's ballistic missile test by Pyongyang, Cheong Wa Dae said Wednesday. During a 25-minute phone conversation, the two leaders also agreed to seek stronger sanctions against Pyongyang at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). It was their fifth phone call since Moon's May 10 inauguration, and came only five days after the previous one. Wednesday's phone call was made at Abe's request. "Moon and Abe agreed that the pressure on North Korea should increase to an extreme level so that the North will come forward for dialogue," presidential spokesman Park Soo-hyun said. Their conversation indicated the two countries and the international community will focus on new and stronger pressure and sanctions against Pyongyang for now, rather than seeking dialogue, as the latest test was grave enough to heighten tension on the Korean Peninsula and in Northeast Asia. North Korea confirmed Wednesday that it launched a Hwasong-12 intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) that flew over Japan. The range of the missile, about 2,700 kilometers, also showed Pyongyang could strike the U.S. territory of Guam, about 3,000 kilometers away, as it had earlier threatened. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe The North's Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) said that leader Kim Jong-un supervised the launch and ordered his military to prepare more launches of missiles targeting the Pacific Ocean. "Moon said the IRBM launch over Japan was violence against a neighboring country," Park said. The KCNA said the launch of the missile was to counter the Ulchi Freedom Guardian joint military exercise between the United States and South Korea. [Missile test] [Hwasong-12] [Joint US military] [SK Japan]
• Can Prime Minister Abe regain his foreign policy leadership?
  by Kazuhiko Togo Kazuhiko Togo (kazutogo@tkk.att.ne.jp), director of the Institute for World Affairs at Kyoto Sangyo University, is former Ambassador of Japan to the Netherlands. This commentary is based on an article that will appear in East Asia Forum. The summer of 2017 will be a time to remember for Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo. Since he returned to power in December 2012, his policies have appeared to be in good shape, and it looked like he would serve three full terms — nine years — as Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) president, leaving office in September 2021. In February, the Yomiuri Shimbun, a newspaper generally considered to back Abe, reported his support rating had reached 66 percent (his negative rating was 24 percent). But in July it dropped to 36 percent (negative ratings hit 52 percent), the Mainichi Shimbun put his support rate at 26 percent (his negative was 56 percent,) and Jiji Press had him at 29.9 percent (with negatives at 48.6 percent). This decline was created by domestic scandals.
  Since Japan’s safety is at stake, at some time in this process Abe is bound to change course and turn toward dialogue. Paradoxically, since Abe’s public message has constantly been that he “opts for pressure now,” his shift may produce tangible results. Has Abe and his security team examined all available information to ensure that they don’t miss that turning point? [Abe Shinzo] [Corruption] [Japan NK] [Yasukuni]
• Japan doubles down on its U.S. alliance
  From left, Japanese Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera and Foreign Minister Taro Kono answer questions from the media with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis after a meeting of the U.S.-Japan Security Consultative Committee at the State Department. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images) By Josh Rogin Global Opinions August 27 at 7:58 PM Facing an immediate threat from North Korea and the long-term challenge of a rising China, Japan finds itself forced to rely on a Washington roiled by constant turmoil and led by an unpredictable president. Yet rather than turn away from the Trump administration, like some European allies, the Japanese government has doubled down on its U.S. alliance. Personal ties between President Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe are strong, and there’s zero public daylight between the governments on key issues. Privately, however, there surely is growing anxiety in Tokyo about the Trump administration — and in particular, worry that Washington may be wavering on its commitment to the elimination of North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. Just before he was fired, White House chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon said what many in Washington were thinking: There’s no viable military option for preventing a nuclear North Korea. “They got us,” Bannon said in an interview with the American Prospect. The day after Bannon’s interview, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson publicly clarified the administration’s position and defended the credibility of the North Korea military option, standing alongside their Japanese counterparts, Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera and Foreign Minister Taro Kono. For Japan there’s no debate: North Korea’s nuclear program must be eliminated, not contained, Kono told me in an interview, after meeting with Mattis and Tillerson. Japan is depending on the United States to stick to that plan. [Japanese remilitarisation] [US Japan alliance] [Threat] [Pretext] [China confrontation] [Wishful thinking]
• Japan's sanctions on Chinese firms, individual doing business with NK will hurt China ties
  By Liu Xin Source:Global Times Published: 2017/8/25 22:33:39 Tokyo penalizes 4 Chinese firms, one person over North Korea trade China said on Friday that Japan's sanctions on a number of companies and individuals linked to trading with North Korea, which involved four Chinese companies and one person, have severely damaged China's interests and sovereignty, and will create new political obstacles to China-Japan ties. "China is strongly dissatisfied with and opposes Japan's unilateral actions," Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying told a press briefing on Friday. China has fully implemented UN Security Council sanctions on North Korea and opposes unilateral sanctions from any country, especially those targeting Chinese companies or individuals, Hua said. Japan's Cabinet on Friday approved the imposition of new sanctions on a number of companies and individuals from China, Namibia and North Korea in a bid to further pressure Pyongyang over its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, Kyodo News reported. Tokyo identified four Chinese companies and two Namibian firms, as well as one Chinese individual and a North Korean individual as new targets of sanctions, according to Kyodo News. Hua said that Japan's move has severely damaged China's interests and judicial sovereignty and will create new political obstacles to China-Japan ties. "China is asking Japan to stop its wrong moves, and Japan should shoulder the consequences if it insists on doing so," Hua said. "Japan's sanctions are in step with the US and would negatively influence the relations between China and Japan," Zhou Yongsheng, a professor at the China Foreign Affairs University's Institute of International Relations, told the Global Times on Friday. This year marks the 45th anniversary of the normalization of China-Japan relations. The two countries restored diplomatic relations in 1972 after reaching an important consensus on properly handling history, Taiwan question, the Diaoyu Islands and other issues. The US Treasury Department slapped economic sanctions on 10 companies and six people from China and Russia on Tuesday, claiming that the measures are aimed at stopping them from doing business with North Korea, which funnels the money it receives to its nuclear and missile programs, Reuters reported. "By imposing the sanctions, Japan is cooperating with the US and further cementing the US-Japan alliance," Lü Yaodong, director of the Department of Japanese Diplomacy at the Institute of Japanese Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Friday. Lü said that previous experiences have shown that instead of solving the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue, unilateral sanctions and military drills have worsened the situation. The US-Japan alliance is not leading efforts to maintain peace as they have claimed, and is affecting regional stability, Lü said. "China has always opposed any unilateral action outside of UN resolutions, and urges all parties to exercise restraint, instead of imposing sanctions and adding to military threats," Lü said, adding that China believes all parties should return to the negotiating table as the most practicable way of resolving the Korean Peninsula issue. The UN Security Council on August 5 passed a resolution imposing new sanctions on North Korea for its continued intercontinental ballistic missile tests. The latest sanctions slashed North Korea's annual export revenue of $3 billion by more than a third, CNN reported. And the US is using the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue as an excuse to increase its military presence in the Asia-Pacific region, and Japan will do so as well, Lü said, noting that Japan has increased its 2018 military budget. The Japanese Defense Ministry plans to seek a budget of 5.26 trillion yen ($48.1 billion) for fiscal year 2018 to strengthen its ballistic missile defense capabilities, Japanese newspaper The Mainichi reported on Wednesday. "Japan should be more prudent in dealing with the Korean Peninsula issue. Instead of ignoring its neighbors' positions, it should be responsible for safeguarding regional stability," Lü said. Newspaper headline: Japan sanctions hurt China ties [Secondary sanctions] [China confrontation] [Japan NK]
• Military exercises take place at time of receding tensions between US, North Korea
  Posted on : Aug.21,2017 18:01 KST Modified on : Aug.21,2017 18:01 KST Korean Defense Minister Song Young-moo meets with Command of US Pacific Command Harry Harris at Yongsan-gu, Seoul, on Aug. 20 (Yonhap News) Top US military officials arrive in Korea for commencement of Ulchi Freedom Guardian joint exercises South Korea and the US began the Ulchi Freedom Guardian joint military exercises on Aug. 21, a move that was expected to cause tensions on the Korean Peninsula to soar. It appears that the US and North Korea have both taken a step back, but officials both inside and outside the military have not ruled out the possibility of a provocation taking place before the joint exercises finish on Aug. 31. Against this backdrop, there has been a great deal of interest in the visits to Korea paid by key US military officials on Aug. 20, including Harry Harris, Commander of the US Pacific Command and John Hyten, Commander of the US Strategic Command. [Joint US military] [Tension]
• President calls for two-track approach in South Korea-Japan relations
  Posted on : Aug.16,2017 18:15 KST Modified on : Aug.16,2017 18:15 KST President Moon Jae-in and his wife, Kim Jung-sook greet former ‘comfort women’ Lee Yong-su (far left) and Gil Won-ok during the commemoration ceremonies for the 72nd Liberation Day at the Sejong Center for Performing Arts in Seoul on Aug. 15. (Blue House Photo Pool) Liberation Day address seeks to strike balance between past grievances, future cooperation During his Liberation Day address on Aug. 15, South Korean President Moon Jae-in said that South Korea-Japan relations would not be held up by historical issues, but that those issues should not be ignored, either. This reiterates a “two-track” approach that deals with South Korea and Japan’s historical disputes separately from other policies. At the same time, Moon declared he would apply “the principles of the international community” when dealing with victims of the two countries’ historical conflicts. Curiously, however, Moon’s address did not ask Japan to take “legal responsibility” or make an “official apology,” demands that the former comfort women for the Japanese army have made and that Moon himself has previously mentioned. [SK - Japan]
• Abe again refrains from expressing war remorse during memorial address
  Posted on : Aug.16,2017 18:18 KST Modified on : Aug.16,2017 18:18 KST Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe speaks at a war memorial service on Aug. 15, the 72nd anniversary of the end of World War II. (AP/Yonhap News) Japanese Prime Minister refuses to acknowledge Japanese culpability in Second World War Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe continued a five-year pattern of not mentioning remorse over Japan’s past aggressions during an Aug. 15 memorial service marking the anniversary of the end of World War II. Speaking at the 72nd national memorial ceremony for Japan’s war dead at the Budokan arena in Tokyo’s Chiyoda ward, Abe stressed that the “horrors of war must not be repeated,” but once again omitted mention of remorse over [Japan’s] responsibility for the war. After a precedent set in 1993 by then-leader Morihiro Hosokawa, memorial addresses by subsequent Japanese prime ministers included mentions of the “immense damage and suffering” Japan caused to people in other Asian countries and expressions of “deep remorse and mourning.” In contrast, Abe has not included the mentions in any of his memorial ceremony addresses since taking office in 2013. Since 2015, he has simplified the “oath of renunciation of war” made by previous Prime Ministers into a statement that the “horrors of war must not be repeated.” [Abe Shinzo] [Japanese colonialism]
• Chosen-seki Koreans granted permission to visit their homeland
  Posted on : Aug.16,2017 18:17 KST Modified on : Aug.16,2017 18:17 KST Protestors held a press conference at Sejong Park in Gwanghwamun on July 12 to demand that Chosen-seki Koreans living in Japan be given permission to travel to the country freely. President Moon’s announcement signaled a reverse in policy from his conservative predecessors President Moon Jae-in referred to the plight of overseas Koreans maintaining Chosen-seki status and announced plans to allow them to freely visit their home country in his National Liberation Day celebratory address on Aug. 15. The term “Chosen-seki” refers to Zainichi Koreans who have lived in Japan since Liberation without adopting South Korean citizenship or naturalizing. “Many of our fellow Koreans have been unable to return even after Liberation,” noted Moon. [Zainichi]
• Japanese military directly administered comfort stations, unearthed US documents show
  Posted on : Aug.13,2017 10:19 KST Modified on : Aug.13,2017 10:19 KST Documents discovered in US National Archives by National Institute of Korean History New documents have surfaced showing the Japanese military was directly involved in the administration of “comfort women” and comfort houses in war zones. The National Institute of Korean History (NIKH) revealed four documents on Aug. 11 that had been found at the US National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) as part of a project to collect and compile data on Japanese military comfort women and war crimes. [Comfort women]
• JAPAN SCENARIOS: VULNERABILITY TO TERRORISM OF NUCLEAR SPENT FUEL MANAGEMENT
  JOAN DIAMOND, PETER HAYES, DAVID VON HIPPEL August 11, 2017 I. INTRODUCTION In this essay, the authors present three bold, creative stories about possible non-state nuclear terrorist attacks involving nuclear spent fuel in Japan. These were: a) Frustrated North Koreans attack spent nuclear fuel in Japan; b) Frustrated civil society actors instigate spent fuel terrorism in Japan; and c) Frustrated insiders. Based on these scenarios, fourteen critical questions were posed relevant to wherever spent fuel is found, not only in Japan, including: how to reset standards for spent fuel management and security, how to respond to insider threats, and how to determine which domestic, regional and global conditions militate against versus foster the risk that non-state actors will attack nuclear spent fuel and related fuel cycle facilities for terrorist purposes. This Special Report was prepared for the Project on Reducing Risk of Nuclear Terrorism and Spent Fuel Vulnerability In East Asia. It is based on the scenarios group activity at a Nautilus Institute Workshop at International House, Tokyo, September 14-15, 2015, funded by The Macarthur Foundation. This workshop was conducted under Chatham House rules. Thus, the Nautilus Institute staff prepared this report and is completely responsible for its contents. The narratives in this report also depart in some minor respects from those created at the workshop. The views expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Nautilus Institute. Readers should note that Nautilus seeks a diversity of views and opinions on significant topics in order to identify common ground. [Nuclear terrorism]
• Will N.Korea's Nuke Program Spark Arms Race in Northeast Asia?
  By Kim Jin-myung August 10, 2017 10:44 North Korea's rapidly advancing nuclear and missile programs could spark an arms race in Northeast Asia and have a nuclear domino effect on South Korea and Japan. Already there are mounting calls for nuclear armament from conservative South Korean politicians. The New York Times on Tuesday quoted Japan's 2017 defense white paper as stating, "It is possible that North Korea has already achieved the miniaturization of nuclear weapons and has acquired nuclear warheads." It commented, "That bleak assessment is likely to feed a growing debate in Japan about whether the country should acquire the means to launch preemptive military strikes." On Monday, Liberty Korea Party leader Hong Joon-pyo called for the deployment of American tactical nuclear weapons, saying, "Peace will come when we achieve a balance of power, not when we are begging for it." [Arms Race] [Japanese remilitarisation] [Nuclearisation]
• Korean text damages Japanese heritage-listed temple
  Posted : 2017-08-10 13:32 Updated : 2017-08-10 16:11 Korean text and the image of an eye were found carved inside the Todai-ji Buddhist temple complex in Nara Prefecture, Japan, Aug. 8. / Yonhap By Ko Dong-hwan Todai-ji Buddhist temple complex Korean text has been carved into the wall of a UNESCO heritage-listed Japanese temple. Police said cleaners found the damage in the Todai-ji Buddhist temple complex in Nara Prefecture on Tuesday, NHK reported. Three Korean letters, 40 centimeters wide by 10 centimeters high, appeared to have been carved by a pointed object, police said. Next to the word was the carved image of an eye. Police are treating the incident as an offence against the cultural heritage protection law. They have security camera video taken at the scene. The complex is described on the UNESCO World Heritage Site list as one of the "historic monuments of ancient Nara." Its Great Buddha Hall houses the world's largest bronze statue of the Buddha Vairocana, known in Japanese as "Daibutsu."
• North Korea’s Alarmed Neighbors Consider Deploying Deadlier Weapons
  By Jonathan Soble and Choe Sang-Hun Aug. 8, 2017 TOKYO — North Korea’s rapidly advancing nuclear program has prompted politicians in Japan and South Korea to push for the deployment of more powerful weapons, in what could lead to a regional arms race. Some of the new capabilities under consideration in Tokyo and Seoul, Washington’s closest Asian allies, are politically contentious. Adopting them would break with decades of precedent and could require delicate diplomatic finessing. Other military options are already being rolled out or will be soon. In a military policy review published on Tuesday, the Japanese government focused on the threat from North Korea, whose leader, Kim Jong-un, has ordered more than a dozen missile tests this year. Some of those missiles have splashed into waters close to Japan. “North Korea’s development of ballistic missiles and its nuclear program are becoming increasingly real and imminent problems for the Asia-Pacific region including Japan, as well as the rest of the world,” the government in Tokyo said in its annual defense white paper. “It is possible that North Korea has already achieved the miniaturization of nuclear weapons and has acquired nuclear warheads.” [Japanese remilitarisation] [Pretext]
• Shinzo Abe’s fall from grace: of his own making
  BY Aurelia George Mulgan Crucial to Shinzo Abe’s control over his ruling party has been a string of electoral victories under his leadership and his cabinet’s consistently high poll ratings. Both now look increasingly in doubt After a dream run as Prime Minister of Japan, Shinzo Abe’s current political predicament must come as quite a shock. Plummeting poll ratings and electoral failures for his ruling Liberal Democratic Party have turned him into an emperor with no clothes. Two major political setbacks for the LDP in July are creating doubt about both the longevity of Abe’s leadership of the government and his position as LDP president. First was the crushing defeat of the LDP in the Tokyo metropolitan assembly election when its seat numbers fell to a historical low. The second was when a female candidate (backed by the opposition parties in a mayoral election in Sendai City in Miyagi Prefecture) defeated a male candidate supported by Abe’s LDP and its junior coalition partner the Komeito. The elections followed hard on the heels of two ‘school’ scandals that more than hinted at ‘political favours for friends’ by the Prime Minister. They gave voters the opportunity to act on perceptions of corruption in the administration, and register a protest vote. Attempts to evade political accountability With a cursory nod to the principle of political accountability, Diet hearings were held that examined various details of administrative affairs of the government relating to the scandals. However, testimony at these hearings often revealed more about the government’s attempts to evade political accountability rather than to provide accurate accounts of the matters under discussion. There were conflicting statements from Abe, his ministers and secretaries, and from bureaucrats, and denials of actions and involvement that stretched credulity. Then came the scandal involving the Ministry of Defence when minister Tomomi Inada felt compelled to resign to take responsibility for a cover-up within her ministry over the suppression of records of the Japanese Self-Defence Force peacekeeping mission in South Sudan. The records reputedly exposed the extent to which the Abe administration had suppressed details of the extent of conflict in areas where the SDF were serving as peacekeepers. [Abe Shinzo] [Cronyism] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• “There Will Be No Stopping the Okinawan Resistance,” an Interview with Yamashiro Hiroji
  Gavan McCormack and Asia-Pacific Journal Report August 1, 2017 The erosion of civil liberties proceeds apace in Okinawa, the most conspicuous case being the imprisonment for five months (17 October 2016 to 19 March 2017) of Yamashiro Hiroji, head of the Okinawa Peace Movement Center and a prominent activist opposing base activist. In most developed democratic countries, a suspect may be held in police custody for up to four days before she or he is either indicted or released, but in Japan the limit is 23 days,1 and in Yamashiro’s case it was arbitrarily extended by serial arrests on unrelated charges. [Okinawa] [Protest] [Bases]
• The History Problem: The Politics of War Commemoration in East Asia
  Hiro Saito August 1, 2017 Abstract: This essay summarizes my argument in The History Problem: The Politics of War Commemoration in East Asia. The history problem is essentially a relational phenomenon that arises when nations promote self-serving versions of the past by focusing on what happened to their own citizens with little regard for foreign others. East Asia, however, has recently also witnessed the emergence of a cosmopolitan form of commemoration taking humanity, rather than nationality, as its primary frame of reference. When cosmopolitan commemoration is practiced as a collective endeavor by both perpetrators and victims, a resolution of the history problem will finally become possible. [History]
• 'The Battleship Island' Breaks 5 Million Viewer Mark
  english.chosun.com August 03, 2017 12:35 "The Battleship Island" by Ryoo Seung-wan has attracted over 5 million viewers in the eight days since its release last week. This is the fastest pace among all movies released this year in Korea, very much helped by the whopping 970,872 viewers on the first day alone. Ryoo has proved his knack for commercial success once again after it took only 10 days for his previous film "Veteran" to break the 5 million mark in 2015. "The Battleship Island" depicts the plight of Korean slave laborers on Hashima Island in World War II. [Japanese colonialism] [Movie]

---

Return to top of page
JULY 2017

• Vulnerability To Terrorism In Nuclear Spent Fuel Management: An Unsparing Look At Japan’s Current Situation
  Kazuhisa Ogawa July 21, 2017 In this essay, Kazuhisa Ogawa argues for a systematic approach to reduce the risk of global terrorism, including deterrence by denial, and painstaking measures to reduce the risk of nuclear terrorism. He points out that Japan’s official approach remains too formalistic and stove-piped and must be improved by steadfast and painstaking efforts by every sector of Japanese society. He also suggests that a preventative approach is inherently global and should include measures to address the origins and drivers of global terrorism. Kazuhisa Ogawa is Project Professor, University of Shizuoka [Nuclear security] [Terrorism]
• Hundreds of N.Korean Ghost Ships Wash up on Japan's Shores
  By Lee Dong-hwi July 19, 2017 09:55 Hundreds of North Korean fishing boats have washed up on Japan's shores in the last five years after fishermen got lost at sea and died. Japanese media quoted maritime police as saying 227 North Korean fishing boats have washed up there since January 2013. One Japanese government official said, "We can't reveal the number of dead North Koreans who have been discovered considering diplomatic repercussions." Yoshihiko Yamada at Tokai University, said the ghost ships wash up mostly in winter, when the wind blows from Siberia toward Japan. Many more are believed to have been lost at sea, and very few fishermen reach Japanese shores alive. If they set off from the North Korean ports of Hamhung or Wonsan, they drift for 1,000 km over a period of more than two months before their vessel gets stranded on Japanese shores. [Canard] [Fishery]
• Japan’s Legacy of War Crimes in China
  By Kim Petersen Global Research, July 18, 2017 During World War II, Japan’s imperialist military invaded Northeast China and afterward spread throughout Southeast Asia, then on to an ill-fated attack on Pearl Harbor. Japanese crimes were many during the war and included the coerced services of ianfu (comfort women) for Japanese troops, slave labor, and experimentation on living humans. Today Japanese right-wingers clamor for a re-expansion of Japanese militarism; prime minister Abe Shinzo pays visits to a shrine venerating Japanese dead — among them war criminals; the Diet demonstrates belligerence toward North Korea, a country Japan had formerly occupied; Okinawans’ (Japanese living on the southern archipelago) call for the removal of US military bases goes unheeded; and Japanese grapple with racism still rife toward ethnic Koreans in Japan. The current status post-WWII is not pretty and does not bode well for a Japan aspiring to a permanent United Nations Security Council seat. [Japanese colonialism] [War crimes] [Unit 731]
• [Interview] Comfort women issue shouldn’t be a diplomatic matter between governments
  Posted on : Jul.13,2017 17:31 KST Modified on : Jul.13,2017 17:31 KST Kim Dong-suk, chairman of Korean American Civic Empowerment (by Lee Jeong-a, staff photographer) Chairman of Korean-American Civic Empowerment discusses growing Korean-American political engagement in the US “The comfort women issue shouldn’t be approached as a diplomatic issue between South Korea and Japan. It should be approached as an issue pertaining to the universal value of women’s rights,” said Kim Dong-suk, chairman of Korean American Civic Empowerment (KACE), while discussing a resolution about the comfort women that was passed 10 years ago by the US House of Representatives. Kim was visiting South Korea to prepare for the Korean American Grassroots Conference (KAGC), which will be held in Washington from July 24-26. On July 30, 2007, the US House of Representatives unanimously passed House Resolution 121, which urged the Japanese government to apologize to those forced to serve as comfort women for the Japanese army and to address the issue in Japanese textbooks. [Comfort women]
• Moon, Abe to have summit July 7
  Posted : 2017-07-04 13:55 Updated : 2017-07-04 14:48 By Kim Rahn South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will have their first summit July 7 on the sideline of the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany, Cheong Wa Dae said Tuesday. The summit was planned after the two leaders agreed on the need for a swift meeting right after Moon's May 9 election victory. Abe made a congratulatory phone call to Moon May 11 and the two leaders had another call May 30 when North Korea test-fired a missile. Moon also sent a special envoy, Rep. Moon Hee-sang of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, to Japan from May 17 to 20, while Abe's envoy, Toshihiro Nikai, also visited Korea from June 10 to 13. [Moon_Abe17]
• At upcoming G-20 summit, Shinzo Abe could request removal of comfort woman statue
  Posted on : Jul.3,2017 14:53 KST Modified on : Jul.3,2017 14:53 KST Former comfort woman Kang Il-chul during the unveiling ceremony for a comfort woman statue in Brookhaven, Georgia, June 30. (provided by Atlanta Comfort Woman Memorial Task Force) Abe still seeking implementation of Dec. 2015 agreement, which Moon says S. Koreans “cannot emotionally accept” The first comfort woman statue in the southern US has been set up near Atlanta. Meanwhile, Kyodo News reported on July 1 that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe plans to ask President Moon Jae-in at the upcoming G-20 summit to quickly remove a comfort woman statue currently in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul. Around 300 people attended an unveiling ceremony on June 30 for the comfort woman statue in a municipal park in the Atlanta suburb of Brookhaven, including 89-year-old comfort woman survivor Kang Il-chul, Brookhaven mayor John Ernst, councilman John Park, and Philippine consul general in Atlanta Raoul Donato. [Abe Shinzo] [Comfort women]

---

Return to top of page
JUNE 2017

• Sovereign Debt Jubilee, Japanese-Style
  by Ellen Brown Let’s face it. There is no way the US government is ever going to pay back a $20 trillion federal debt. The taxpayers will just continue to pay interest on it, year after year. A lot of interest. If the Federal Reserve raises the fed funds rate to 3.5% and sells its federal securities into the market, as it is proposing to do, by 2026 the projected tab will be $830 billion annually. That’s nearly $1 trillion owed by the taxpayers every year, just for interest. Personal income taxes are at record highs, ringing in at $550 billion in the first four months of fiscal year 2017, or $1.6 trillion annually. But even at those high levels, handing over $830 billion to bondholders will wipe out over half the annual personal income tax take. Yet what is the alternative? Japan seems to have found one. While the US government is busy driving up its “sovereign” debt and the interest owed on it, Japan has been canceling its debt at the rate of $720 billion (¥80tn) per year. How? By selling the debt to its own central bank, which returns the interest to the government. While most central banks have ended their quantitative easing programs and are planning to sell their federal securities, the Bank of Japan continues to aggressively buy its government’s debt. An interest-free debt owed to oneself that is rolled over from year to year is effectively void – a debt “jubilee.” As noted by fund manager Eric Lonergan in a February 2017 article: The Bank of Japan is in the process of owning most of the outstanding government debt of Japan (it currently owns around 40%). BoJ holdings are part of the consolidated government balance sheet. So its holdings are in fact the accounting equivalent of a debt cancellation. If I buy back my own mortgage, I don’t have a mortgage. If the Federal Reserve followed the same policy and bought 40% of the US national debt, the Fed would be holding $8 trillion in federal securities, three times its current holdings from its quantitative easing programs. Eight trillion dollars in money created on a computer screen! Monetarists would be aghast. Surely that would trigger runaway hyperinflation! But if Japan’s experience is any indication, it wouldn’t. Japan has a record low inflation rate of .02 percent. That’s not 2 percent, the Fed’s target inflation rate, but 1/100th of 2 percent – almost zero. Japan also has an unemployment rate that is at a 22-year low of 2.8%, and the yen was up nearly 6% for the year against the dollar as of April 2017. Selling the government’s debt to its own central bank has not succeeded in driving up Japanese prices, even though that was the BoJ’s expressed intent. Meanwhile, the economy is doing well. In a February 2017 article in Mother Jones titled “The Enduring Mystery of Japan’s Economy,” Kevin Drum notes that over the past two decades, Japan’s gross domestic product per capita has grown steadily and is up by 20 percent. [Debt]
• Order of the Rising Sun Awarded to James A. Kelly
  June 27, 2017 Pacific Forum CSIS is proud to announce that the Government of Japan has awarded president emeritus Mr. James A. Kelly (Jim), the decoration of “The Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon,” for his contribution to developing security policies of Japan. The award has noted Jim’s service in International Security Affairs during President Ronald Reagan’s Administration; as former Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs under President George W. Bush; and as former President of the Pacific Forum CSIS. The Order of the Rising Sun is a Japanese order, established in 1875 by Emperor Meiji of Japan. The Order was the first national decoration awarded by the Japanese government, created on 10 April 1875 by decree of the Council of State. The badge features rays of sunlight from the rising sun. The design of the Rising Sun symbolizes energy as powerful as the rising sun in parallel with the “rising sun” concept of Japan (“Land of the Rising Sun”). The order is awarded to those who have made distinguished achievements in the following fields: international relations, promotion of Japanese culture, advancements in their field, development in welfare or preservation of the environment. We, along with the entire Pacific Forum CSIS “ohana,” applaud this honor. Congratulations to Jim on this well-deserved recognition! [Japanese remilitarisation] [US Japan alliance] [MISCOM] [Agreed Framework
• Japan reportedly to deploy Aegis Ashore system instead of THAAD
  Posted on : Jun.24,2017 16:29 KST Modified on : Jun.24,2017 16:29 KST twitter Components of the THAAD missile defense system being brought in to the deployment site in Seongju, North Gyeongsang Province. (by Kim Seong-gwang, staff photographer) Tokyo’s preference of Aegis Ashore over THAAD for defense against North Korean missiles comes down to cost-effectiveness. The Japanese Ministry of Defense reportedly plans to defer deployment of THAAD in favor of an Aegis Ashore system. The Asahi Shimbun newspaper, citing anonymous government sources, reported on June 23 that the ministry had asked the Japanese government to reflect the costs of deploying Aegis Ashore - a land-based form of Aegis missile defense system - in the 2018 budget. The 2017 Japanese government budget includes funds appropriated for preliminary investigations of possible deployments of both THAAD and Aegis Ashore. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Missile defense] THAAD] [Aegis]
• Japanese Energy Policies After Fukushima
  Kae Takase June 23 2017 In this essay, after tracing the evolution of Japan’s energy policy and economy in the years after Fukushima, Kae Takase concludes: “The Japanese electricity sector will undergo dramatic and disruptive changes in the coming years. The future of nuclear reactor restarts, retail market deregulation, unbundling of transmission and distribution from generation, and of the renewable electricity business all remain unclear as of this writing, with significant additional debate at the national and local levels likely before any of these issues are fully settled.” [Energy]
• Japan wants to expand arms deals with Southeast Asia as China exports ‘low cost’ weapons
  Shinzo Abe’s government wants to make arms sales and military technology collaboration a new plank of Japanese diplomacy PUBLISHED : Monday, 12 June, 2017, 6:24pm UPDATED : Monday, 12 June, 2017, 10:06pm A defence official said Monday that Japan is seeking to increase its sales of military equipment to Southeast Asian nations amid growing tensions with China and North Korea The move is part of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s push to bolster Japan’s military role and its sales of defence equipment, especially in Southeast Asia, where China has expanded its own arms sales. Hideaki Watanabe, head of the Defence Ministry’s Acquisition Technology and Logistics Agency, said Japan will host a meeting Thursday with defence officials from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to discuss the sharing of equipment and technology. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Arms sales]
• Deficiency Of Nuclear Security—Historical Perspectives On Japan’s Fuel-Cycle Policy
  June 15, 2017 Overview Almost every national governmental policy is a product of a wide-range of political and social factors. In this sense, as long as the Shinzo Abe administration of Japan stay at the highest office, even facing substantial and un-faded public opposition against resumption of nuclear-power-plant operation, the current Japan’s fuel cycle policy which originated in “Long-term National Program on Nuclear Development and Use in 1956” will be sustained for at least several years.[1] The main reason the author (Ota) assumes this to be true is the strong will and apparently unshakable determination of the Abe administration which considers nuclear power to be essential for success of Abe’s front-banner economic, monetary and growth policy, “Abenomics.” [Fuel cycle]
• End Game for Japan’s Construction State - The Linear (Maglev) Shinkansen and Abenomics
  Aoki Hidekazu and Kawamiya Nobuo June 15, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 12 | Number5 Abstract Prime Minister Abe has committed 3 trillion yen ($27 billion) to finance a linear Shinkansen project linking Tokyo and Nagoya/Osaka by Maglev. Technical analysis shows that the Linear Shinkansen constitutes not only an extraordinarily costly but also an abnormally energy-wasting project, consuming in operation between four and five times as much power as the Tokaido Shinkansen which already provides high speed rail connection. Since the 1960s, Japan’s major construction projects have become vastly more costly and less efficient. Deficit-breeding, energy-wasting, environmentally-destructive, and technologically unreliable, the Linear Shinkansen project must be considered a guaranteed fiasco, with the potential not only of its own collapse but of bringing the Tokaido Shinkansen down too. [Maglev] [Shinkansen] [Abe Shinzo]
• Nuclear Terrorism: How Big Is The Risk To Japan?
  Matthew Bunn June 8, 2017 I. INTRODUCTION This essay by Matthew Bunn argues that nine straightforward steps are available for Japan to greatly reduce the risks of nuclear terrorism at reasonable cost. “These include minimizing the use of materials that could be used in nuclear weapons, and providing highly effective security and accounting wherever these materials exist.” Matthew Bunn is an American nuclear and energy policy analyst, currently a professor of practice at the Harvard Kennedy School at Harvard University [Nuclear terrorism]
• Moon, Abe Agree Now Isn't the Time for Dialogue with N.Korea
  May 31, 2017 12:45 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called President Moon Jae-in on Tuesday to discuss how to deal with North Korea's constant missile provocations. In the 20-minute phone call, Abe said the North Korean issue took center stage during the G7 Summit in Italy and that the leaders agreed that the North's nuclear weapons program poses a grave threat to the international community, according to Cheong Wa Dae. Abe said North Korea's launch of a missile on Monday that landed in Japan's exclusive economic zone in the East Sea was a "threat to the international community" and cannot be excused. He added it is meaningless to hold talks with the North simply for the sake of talking and urged the South Korean government, which has sent worrying signals that it wants to weaken sanctions, to cooperate with UN and international efforts to deal with the threat from Pyongyang. President Moon Jae-in speaks with his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe at Cheong Wa Dae on Tuesday. /Courtesy of Cheong Wa Dae Moon was quoted as saying, "I agree with the prime minister's words that now is not a time for dialogue with North Korea, but a time to heighten sanctions and pressure." But he added, "That is why the international community must on the one hand respond firmly and on the other hand continue to send a message that dialogue is possible if North Korea gives up its nuclear development." Moon said he believes Washington agrees that the ultimate goal should be to bring the North to the negotiating table, based on his telephone conversation with U.S. President Donald Trump and from feedback from his special envoy to Washington, who met the American leader. Abe invited Moon to visit Japan soon and Moon said he hopes to discuss specifics during the G20 Summit in Germany in July. [Moon Jae-in] [Abe Shinzo] [[Negotiations] [SK NK policy]
• Japan to introduce GPS satellite to jam North Korean signals
  Posted on : May.30,2017 16:45 KST Modified on : May.30,2017 16:45 KST The launch of Michibiki satellite #1, in September 2010. (from the Asahi Shimbun newspaper) Use of precision GPS would also increase the accuracy of a Japanese strike on North Korean missile bases A global positioning system (GPS) satellite to be launched by Japan next month will have jamming capabilities for North Korean signals, the Sankei Shimbun newspaper reported on May 29. The jamming functions are to be included on the Japanese GPS satellite Michibiki 2, which the Japanese government is scheduled to launch on June 1 from Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima Prefecture. The satellite is being launched by Japan as part of a push to build an independent satellite-based positioning system without relying on US GPS. While GPS is used today for commercial purposes in car navigation and smartphone positioning information, it was first developed by the US in the Cold War era for military purposes. The Japanese GPS is similarly intended for military as well as commercial purposes, including use in Japanese Self-Defense Forces warships and aircraft. The potential military uses are also why the Japanese GPS is including functions for jamming North Korean signals. North Korea has sent signals toward South Korea to prevent the functioning of weapons that operate through GPS. Japan is using special highly encoded signals with the Michibiki 2 that will not be vulnerable to jamming or false signals sent by other parties, the Sankei Shimbun reported. [Cyberwar] [Satellite] Double standards] [Japanese remilitarisation]

---

Return to top of page
MAY 2017

• SPECIAL REPORT BY NOBUMASA AKIYAMA JAPAN’S NUCLEAR SECURITY AFTER THE FUKUSHIMA NUCLEAR ACCIDENT
  May 19, 2017 Introduction In this essay, the key lessons learned after the 311 Fukushima Nuclear Accident are outlined. These lessons pertained to safeguards, security, and safety, and revealed the critical inter-dependency and overlap between these elements, as well as the necessity to attend to each as a disparate imperative in nuclear spent fuel management (see Figure 1). Figure 1: Interface among ‘3S’ Learnt from Fukushima Direct nuclear security lesson With regard to nuclear security, the direct lessons learned were the vulnerability of spent fuel due to location, the method used to store the spent fuel (dry casks, which were located at the basement of the facility, survived well being hit by the tsunami whereas spent fuel pools were affected badly). This experience led to revision of the design basis threat (DBT) and consideration on the reformulation of Japan’s spent fuel management policy. [Japan] [Nuclear security] [Fukushima]
• HALLENGES IN RISK GOVERNANCE FOR SAFETY AND SECURITY IN JAPANESE NUCLEAR POWER SECTOR
  Taketoshi Taniguchi May 18, 2017 I. INTRODUCTION This essay by Taketoshi Taniguchi gives an overview of the risk environment surrounding critical infrastructures including nuclear power, and discusses challenges in nuclear power sector in order to avoid slow-developing catastrophic risk and to mitigate malicious threats. “Ultimately, a well-informed public, on top of adequate emergency preparedness and response plan, and growing capabilities, will be crucial for mitigating malicious threats and risks.” Taketoshi Taniguchi is Professor at the Policy Alternatives Research Institute (PARI), the University of Tokyo. [Nuclear security] [Nuclear terrorism]
• The Remilitarization of Japan, Explained
  Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is setting the country on course for remilitarization, much to the exasperation of Japan's wartime enemies, China and South Korea. On Wednesday, May 3, the outgoing nationalist Abe declared that he hopes to see a revised constitution implemented by 2020, when Tokyo is set to host the Olympics. The proclamation underscored what many have suspected up until now to be the prime minister's intention to move Japan away from its post-World War II pacifist posture, toward a more active one in the Asia-Pacific security environment. Japan's constitution was rewritten in 1947 after the country's formal surrender to the allied forces in September of 1945. The constitution was largely constructed by a new Japanese government under the auspices of the allied powers, principally the United States. Although Japan made some reparations to the countries in which its army committed atrocities, namely South Korea and China, the allied forces sought more than its penitence. They uprooted the country's entire political system, including the removal of the Emperor Hirohito as executive head of state, and imposed the now notorious Article 9 on the Japanese constitution. [Japanese remilitarisation]
• In conversation with Japanese PM, Pres. Moon says majority of S. Koreans don’t accept comfort women agreement
  Posted on : May.12,2017 14:36 KST Modified on : May.12,2017 14:36 KST South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe Moon hopes two sides can “intelligently overcome” historical issues and advance bilateral relations South Korea President Moon Jae-in raised the issue of “popular sentiment” on the comfort women issue in a telephone conversation with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on May 11. In the conversation, Moon attempted to send a clear message that the comfort women agreement reached by the administration of predecessor Park Geun-hye on Dec. 28, 2015, cannot be enforced under its current terms due to intense objections at home. At the same time, Moon also immediately stressed the need for “joint efforts” rather than renegotiation - sending the message that Seoul and Tokyo should work together on a solution rather than remaining at odds on the issue. Moon also stressed the need for a “two-track” approach of dealing separately with historical concerns and other issues in the two sides’ cooperative relationship, including the North Korean nuclear issue. During the telephone conversation, Moon responded to remarks from Abe expressing “hope for faithful implementation of the comfort women agreement.” “The reality is that a majority of South Koreans do not emotionally accept that agreement,” Moon replied. Moon went on to say there were “limits to the government’s ability to resolve issues that arise in civilian domains,” adding that “some time will be needed.” [Moon Jae-in] [Comfort women]
• To counter China’s AIIB, Japan contributes $40 million to ADB
  Posted on : May.8,2017 16:14 KST Modified on : May.8,2017 16:14 KST Funds to go to “high-quality infrastructure,” which may not be enough to affect China’s strong influence in Asia Japan has declared plans to contribute US$40 million to the Asian Development Bank (ADB), a financial institution under its leadership, in an apparent measure to check the growing influence of the Chinese-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). “Infrastructure demand in Asia is poised to reach US$26 trillion in the next 15 years. We plan to strengthen the Asian Development Bank to organize high-quality infrastructure,” said Japanese Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Taro Aso at an ADB general meeting in Yokohama on May 6. To achieve this, an “advanced technology support fund” is to be established within ADB, with Japan putting up US$40 million for it over the next two years, Aso said. The ADB is a financial institution co-founded by Japan with the US in 1966 after the former’s successful revival in the wake of its World War II surrender. Japan’s leading role - as evidenced by the fact that all of the bank’s governors have been Japanese - has given it major influence in Asia. [China confrontation] [ADB] [AIIB] [Finance] [Softpower]
• Missile Defense and the Security Dilemma: THAAD, Japan’s “Proactive Peace,” and the Arms Race in Northeast Asia
  JJ Suh
  April 27, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 9 | Number5 Abstract: The U.S. deployed a missile defense system, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) in South Korea in April 2017, citing North Korea’s nuclear and missile “threats” as justification. Its deployment, however, needs to be seen in the wider strategic context. Not only does the measure raise the arms race with North Korea, it also facilitates Japan’s “proactive contribution to peace” and exacerbates the security dilemma between the U.S. and its allies on one side and China and Russia on the other. [THAAD] [Missile defense] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• When North Korean threat becomes tool for taking political advantage in Japan
  Posted on : May.7,2017 08:18 KST Modified on : May.7,2017 08:18 KST A helicopter lands on the JS Izumo, the largest cruiser in the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF), at the Port of Yokosuka in Kanagawa Prefecture (EPA/Yonhap News) Groups in South Korea and Japan play up tensions caused by North Korea to expand their own power base For more than month after coming to Japan as the Hankyoreh’s Tokyo correspondent, the word that saw or heard the most in the Japanese news was probably “Kitachosen” (???), which is Japanese for “North Korea.” For a month, there was an unending stream of news articles with headlines like “tension in North Korea” and “how to save Japanese in South Korea if the US attacks North Korea.” Perhaps such headlines could be overlooked, since it’s true that the Japanese are worried, but it was aggravating to see the titles of numerous articles in newspapers like the Evening Fuji (affiliated with the right-wing Sankei Shimbun) with hardly any evidence to back up their claims, such as one that predicted there would be one million refugees in the event of a crisis on the Korean Peninsula. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Pretext] [Threat]
• Japanese remilitarisation
  On Abe using tension in Korea to promote scrapping of the Peace Constitution and to advance remilitarisation, and how this serves US confrontation with China, and with Russia
  Segment of RT interview with Tim Beal [Japanese remilitarisation] [China confrontation] [US global strategy]
• First Japanese naval cruiser sets off on mission to protect US warship
  Posted on : May.2,2017 16:23 KST Modified on : May.2,2017 16:23 KST A helicopter lands on the JS Izumo, the largest cruiser in the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF), at the Port of Yokosuka in Kanagawa Prefecture (EPA/Yonhap News)
  Critics in Japan accuse Japan Self-Defense Forces of using North Korea tensions to increase its scope of activities
  A Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) cruiser set sail for the first time with the mission of armed peacetime protection of US warships. The JS Izumo, the largest cruiser in the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF), departed the Port of Yokosuka in Kanagawa Prefecture on May 1 with a mission of “armed protection” of US Navy logistic ships approaching the Korean Peninsula. The Izumo is to carry out its mission over a two-day period, joining the logistic ships - which are supplying items to the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier strike group approaching the waters off the Korean Peninsula - at the Boso Peninsula in Japan’s Kanto region and proceeding as far as the waters off Shikoku. After that, it is scheduled to take part in a May 15 naval review in Singapore. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Pretext]
• As North Korea launches ballistic missile, Tokyo halts subway service
  Posted on : May.1,2017 17:47 KST Modified on : May.1,2017 17:47 KST Subway stoppage the latest bit of fretting in Japan over possible Korean peninsula crisis Starting at 6:07 am on Apr. 29, when North Korea unsuccessfully launched a ballistic missile, and continuing for about 10 minutes, the Tokyo subway intercom played an announcement that it was temporarily suspending operations because of the missile launch, “There are reports that North Korea has launched a ballistic missile. We are suspending the operation of all lines on the Tokyo subway system for our customers’ safety.” Toshiyaki Kanda, a journalist, heard the announcement at Kasumigaseki Station on the Hibiya Line, but he had to get in touch with friends on Facebook to learn that Japan had not been hit. “Hearing the announcement, I wondered whether this meant that the missile had come all the way [to Japan]. Passengers remained calm, but there could have been trouble if it was a crowded time of day,” Kanda told the Tokyo Shimbun newspaper. The Tokyo metro announced that around 10,300 passengers had been affected by the suspension of operations. [Missile test] [Hysteria] [Japanese remilitarisation] [Pretext]

---

Return to top of page
APRIL 2017

• Japan plans to block North Korean terrorists, report says
  Posted : 2017-04-28 17:10 Updated : 2017-04-28 17:12 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is preparing guidelines on accepting refugees while blocking terrorists. / Korea Time file By Eom Da-sol Japan will set guidelines to block terrorists entering the country with refugees if war breaks out on the Korean Peninsula, according to the Mainichi Daily on Friday. With North Korea continuing to provoke the U.S, and the U.S. announcing retaliatory measures, Japan is putting in place guidelines to approve Korean refugees and foreigners entering the country. Japan reportedly assumes that thousands of refugees will arrive if North Korea hits the South first. Under this scenario, Japan will decide the main ports to accept refugees. Immigration control officers will carefully examine the identities and luggage to prevent North Korean spies and terrorists from entering. Japan also plans to build refugee camps near the ports. "The government is setting up protocols for aircraft landings, refugee camps and guidelines to screen refugees," Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told the House of Representatives last Monday. According to guidelines released so far, Japan plans to enhance maritime security with stricter daily patrols, and to provide food and water to refugee camps guarded by national police. The refugees will also receive physical check-ups. Foreigners who have families or acquaintances in Japan, who can be acknowledged as refugees under the 1951 Refugee Convention, and who are in transit from the nation to another will be allowed to enter. [Refugees] [Japan SK]
• Japan warns citizens they might have only 10 minutes to prepare for a North Korean missile
  By Anna Fifield April 25 at 2:05 AM A woman walks past a television screen showing file footage of a North Korean missile launch, at a railway station in Seoul. (AFP/Getty Images) TOKYO — North Korea might be talking about building missiles that can reach the United States, but Kim Jong Un’s regime already has lots of missiles that can reach Japan. So the Japanese government is preparing its citizens in case a missile comes their way — possibly with less than 10 minutes’ warning. The prime minister’s office issued new “actions to protect yourself” guidelines this week, including for the first time instructions on how to respond if a North Korean ballistic missile is heading toward Japan. Three of the four missiles that North Korea launched March 6 fell within Japan’s exclusive economic zone in the Sea of Japan, the body of water that separates Japan and the Korean Peninsula. North Korea later said that it was practicing to hit U.S. military bases in Japan. North Korea showed almost two decades ago that it has all of Japan in its reach. In 1998, North Korea fired a Taepodong-1 missile — ostensibly for launching a satellite — over Japan and into its economic zone on the Pacific Ocean side. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Hysteria]
• South Korea and Japan set to joust again over use of “East Sea”
  Posted on : Apr.25,2017 17:26 KST Modified on : Apr.25,2017 17:26 KST The website of the International Hydrographic Organization Both countries planning public relations campaigns ahead of 19th International Hydrographic Organization assembly South Korea and Japan’s diplomatic war over use of the term “East Sea” rather than “Sea of Japan” in international standard nautical charts is reigniting after five years. On Apr. 24, the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that the 19th International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) assembly was taking place through Apr. 28 in Monaco. The assembly is expected to see fierce diplomatic campaigns by South Korea and Japan over amendment of the IHO’s nautical chart publication “Limits of Oceans and Seas” (S-23) and related listings using the name “East Sea.” S-23, which serves as a reference standard when publishing nautical charts, has listed the East Sea as the “Sea of Japan” since its first publication in 1929. [East Sea] [Nomenclature]
• USS Carl Vinson to hold joint exercises with Japanese navy
  Posted on : Apr.24,2017 15:07 KST Modified on : Apr.24,2017 15:07 KST The USS Carl Vinson (left) in the waters off Indonesia, with the USS Michael Murphy (center) and the USS Lake Champlain, Apr. 14. (Yonhap News) Japanese media report that exercises are intended to underscore alliance with US and pressure North Korea Japanese newspaper the Yomiuri Shimbun reported that the USS Carl Vinson, the US aircraft carrier that is moving toward waters near the Korean Peninsula, would begin joint exercises with the Japan Self-Defense Forces on Apr. 23. On a visit to Australia, US Vice President Mike Pence said that the USS Carl Vinson would be arriving in the East Sea in a few days, before the end of the month. Pence make the comments during a joint press conference with Australia Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull following their meeting on Apr. 22. The Yomiuri Shimbun quoted an anonymous Japanese government official in a report stating that two ships with the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force were joining the USS Carl Vinson carrier group in the Western Pacific Ocean to conduct joint exercises beginning on Apr. 23. The joint exercises are designed to increase pressure on North Korea by emphasizing the US-Japan alliance, the newspaper reported. [Vinson] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Japan overreacts with plan to evacuate nationals from S. Korea if N. Korea strikes
  Posted on : Apr.22,2017 14:23 KST Modified on : Apr.22,2017 14:23 KST Prime Minister Shinzo Abe speaks at a budget committee session of the House of Councilors at the Parliament in Tokyo on Mar. 24. (EPA/Yonhap News) PM Abe also saying a crisis on the Korean Peninsula could be opportunity to rescue Japanese kidnapped by North Korea The Japanese government is gradually becoming more blatant in its attempts to provoke tensions on the Korean Peninsula. Japanese newspaper the Mainichi Shimbun reported on Apr. 21 that the Japanese government has undertaken a detailed review of ways to evacuate Japanese people staying in South Korea in the event of an armed conflict. Considering that the US military would presumably evacuate Americans living in South Korea if the US launched a preemptive strike on North Korea, Tokyo’s plan includes the option of evacuating Japanese by plane, the newspaper reported. Toward this end, Tokyo would reportedly increase the number of flights operated by civilian airlines and, if that were not enough, also dispatch planes from the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF). The plan also recommends that Japanese stay for 72 hours in the shelters designated by the South Korean government if North Korea launches an attack on South Korea. If the attack continues and the greater Seoul area is deemed to be unsafe, Tokyo has even reportedly developed a detailed plan for moving Japanese to the southern end of South Korea and then shipping them to Kyushu or the Chugoku region of Japan. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Abe Shinzo] [Pretext] [Intervention]
• Japanese government deletes online report about Kanto Earthquake massacre of Koreans
  Posted on : Apr.20,2017 15:40 KST Modified on : Apr.20,2017 15:40 KST Koreans massacred in the wake of the Great Kanto Earthquake, in Tokyo in 1923 Online document was drafted by expert group to provide future generations with lessons from tragedies The Japanese government surreptitiously deleted a report from its webpage with details about the massacre of Koreans in the wake of the Great Kanto Earthquake, a newspaper reported. The Asahi Shimbun newspaper reported on Apr. 19 that Japan’s Cabinet Office deleted a disaster-related report on its webpage that contained accounts of the massacre of Koreans at the time of the 1923 earthquake. The deleted report was drafted between 2003 and 2010 by the Expert Council on Carrying on the Lessons of Disasters, a group affiliated with the Japanese government. In addition to the Great Kanto Earthquake, the report also included details about numerous other disasters, with the goal of teaching future generations about lessons learned from tragedies since the Edo era. The Cabinet Office removed the entire report - not just the portions about the earthquake - from its web page, noting that many critics had complained about its treatment of the massacre of Koreans in the earthquake’s wake. The massacre is addressed in the report in a section titled “Incidents of Murder and Injury.” “Over 105,000 people died or disappeared [at the time of the Great Kanto Earthquake], with upwards of 1% of [those who died] believed to have been murdered,” the report said. “Numerous murders were committed by authorities and local residents. Many instances could be appropriately described as massacres. Koreans accounted for the largest number of targets, and a minority of Chinese and Japanese people were also victimized,” it continued. [Massacre] [Censorship] [Racism] [Kanto Earthquake]
• [Interview] Shinzo Abe using Korean tensions to push Constitutional revision
  Posted on : Apr.19,2017 16:39 KST Modified on : Apr.19,2017 16:39 KST Tetsuo Maeda, 78, a progressive military analyst from Japan Japanese Prime Minister recently made baseless claim that North Korea could launch missile loaded with sarin gas Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe seems intent on raising tensions on the Korean Peninsula with his recent comments about the possibility of North Korea already having the potential to launch missiles loaded with sarin gas without offering any evidence to back up his claim. Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party has asked the government to acquire the capability to strike enemy bases - in particular, North Korea’s missile bases. During an interview with the Hankyoreh on Apr. 17, Tetsuo Maeda, 78, a progressive-leaning military analyst from Japan, said that Abe and the Liberal Democrats appear to be attempting to exploit the recent tensions on the Korean Peninsula and that the doctrine of enemy base strike capability could be used as grounds for revising Japan’s so-called Peace Constitution. Maeda is a security expert who has contributed articles to the progressive monthly magazine Sekai, among other publications, in which he analyzes and criticizes the Abe administration’s security policy. [Abe Shinzo] [Japanese remilitarisation] [Threat] [Pretext] [Sarin]
• Japanese media and government fanning fears of Korean peninsula crisis
  Posted on : Apr.13,2017 16:54 KST Modified on : Apr.13,2017 16:54 KST Tokyo may be trying to drum up concerns over North Korea as a pretext for expanding its military power The Japanese government and media are involved in an aggressive “security peddling” push, fanning fears of potential crisis on the Korean Peninsula with the arrival of the US aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson. In a visit to the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) abductee issue headquarters on Apr. 12, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he would “request the US‘s cooperation on the rescue of [Japanese] abductees [to North Korea] if several instances arise.” The message, which signaled Tokyo’s plans to rescue Japanese nationals from North Korea if a military clash occurs on the Korean Peninsula, reflected Abe’s awareness that US forces would be sent into North Korea in such a situation. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Intervention]
• Japan scrambles jet fighters at record pace as Chinese military activity rises
  A Japanese Air Self Defense Force F-15 fighter scrambles at the Air Self Defense Force Naha base in Naha, Okinawa prefecture, Japan, in this photo taken by Kyodo April 13, 2015. Mandatory credit Kyodo/via REUTERS Okinawa is home to the biggest concentration of U.S. Marine Corp forces outside the United States, hosting the bulk of the roughly 50,000 U.S. military personnel stationed in Japan. Japan's air force scrambled fighter jets to chase away foreign aircraft at record pace in the year to March 31, government figures showed on Thursday, as Chinese military activity in and around the East China Sea escalated. Japan worries that China's probing of its air defenses is part of a push to extend its military influence in the East China Sea and western Pacific, where Japan controls an island chain stretching 1,400 km (870 miles) south towards Taiwan. [Japanese remilitarisation] [China confrontation]

---

Return to top of page
MARCH 2017

• Japanese envoy becomes laughing stock in Korea
  Posted : 2017-04-04 16:01 Updated : 2017-04-05 15:38 By Yi Whan-woo Japanese Ambassador Yasumasa Nagamine is becoming a laughing stock on online communities after he returned to Korea "empty-handed," Tuesday, in a tug-of-war between the two countries over a "comfort woman" statue. His return promoted mockery online as it came despite no concrete action taken by Korea in line with Japan's demand to remove a statue of a girl set up outside the Japanese Consulate in Busan. The Japanese government had kept Nagamine at home for nearly three months after recalling him on Jan. 9 in retaliation for the installment of the statue, which symbolizes Korean wartime sex slaves. In February, Japan said Nagamine would not be sent back unless the Korean government took satisfactory measures to remove the statue. Tokyo claimed it was against an agreement reached between the two countries in December 2015 to end the dispute over "comfort women." Despite this, the statue still remains in its place. [Comfort women]
• As North Korea fires missiles, some in Japan want the ability to launch strikes
  A member of the Japan Self-Defense Forces stands by a PAC-3 surface-to-air missile launcher unit deployed at the time of a North Korean missile test launch, at the Defense Ministry in Tokyo on March 6. (Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP/Getty Images) By Anna Fifield March 27 at 3:00 AM TOKYO — As the threat from North Korea’s missiles grows, so the calls in Japan for a stronger military response are getting louder. An influential group of politicians is publicly arguing for technically pacifist Japan to acquire the ability to strike North Korea instead of having to rely on the United States for its defense. “Japan can’t just wait until it’s destroyed,” Hiroshi Imazu, the head of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s security committee and a proponent of the idea, said in an interview. “It’s legally possible for Japan to strike an enemy base that’s launching a missile at us, but we don’t have the equipment or the capability.” [Japanese remilitarisation] [Threat]
• Geriatric Groove
  The message from the five members of the G-POP All Stars boyband – average age 68 – is old guys are cool.
  By Daniel Hurst March 25, 2017 9:34 AM (UTC+8) • • While the economists and demographers warn of a dark future for Japan’s rapidly ageing society, a bunch of grandfathers have turned the tables on the gloom and doom by starting a boyband (average age 68) and telling the world old guys just wanna have fun. You have heard of J-Pop, now meet G-Pop – a play on the Japanese word Ojii-san for old men. The question seems to be: Yes, Japan’s workforce is aging fast, so what else is new? The five members of the hip G-POP All Stars, who range in age from 59 to 81, have produced music videos poking fun at going grey instead of worrying about it. Their latest song, titled I Was Young, has attracted more than 640,000 views since it was uploaded to YouTube last month. The band has a collective age of 341. The clip shows the men – in white suits, bandanas, fedora hats and slick sunglasses – strutting their stuff, sort of, and driving along a coast road in a red 1950s American convertible as they croon about girls, how time passes fast, and how much they love life in southern Japan. Sample lyrics: We are G-POP from Japan Can not speak English Sky is blue. Don’t be afraid Life is great Throw your phone into the sea [Ageing society]
• Opposition seeks Akie Abe's testimony
  China Daily, March 25, 2017 Japan's major opposition parties agreed on Friday to seek the summoning of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's wife, Akie, and Osaka Governor Ichiro Matsui to give sworn testimony in parliament. The move came after Yasunori Kagoike, the head of the Osaka-based education institution Moritomo Gakuen, stood by his claim in testimony on Thursday that Akie Abe had given hima donation of 1 million yen ($9,000) on Abe's behalf. "The curtain did not close on the problem (with Kagoike's testimony in the parliament), but rather just opened," said Renho Murata, leader of the Democratic Party, Japan's largest opposition party, on Thursday. Opposition parties are questioning Kagoike's ties with the Abes, which are believed to be part of the political power that helped Kagoike win a favorable land deal for Moritomo Gakuen, a private school. Kagoike said in his testimony on Thursday that Akie Abe's aide, Saeko Tani, made inquiries for him in 2015 to Japan's Finance Ministry about the land. [Abe Shinzo] [Corruption]
• Book debates Japan's choice between US, China
  By Zhang Lulu China.org.cn, March 23, 2017 "The Japanese Dream" is co-written by retired Chinese colonel Liu Mingfu and Japanese scholar Yoshikazu Kato. A retired Chinese colonel and a young Japanese scholar recently co-wrote a book named "The Japanese Dream," in which the two - despite standing at different ends of the spectrum - debate Japan’s aspirations going forward and its choice between China and the United States. Colonel Liu Mingfu and Yoshikazu Kato attended a book launch event in Beijing on Wednesday, held by Chinese think tank, Charhar Institute, where Kato is a researcher. The book, written in a question and answer format between the two, revolves around a central theme of Japan’s standing between China and the United States, as exemplified by the words on the dust jacket "how Japan chooses in the centennial game between China and United States." [Dilemma] [Allegiance]
• Amid North Korea threat, Tillerson hints that ‘circumstances could evolve’ for a Japanese nuclear arsenal
  by Jesse Johnson Staff Writer Mar 19, 2017 The possibility of a nuclear-armed Japan has again been raised by the Trump administration, after U.S. Secretary of State Tillerson appeared to say in an interview ahead of his visit to Beijing that, with “all options on the table” regarding the North Korean threat, “circumstances could evolve” in terms of Tokyo acquiring atomic weapons. In an interview Saturday with the lone reporter allowed to accompany him on his visits to Japan, South Korea and China, the top U.S. diplomat, who had previously dismissed the need for Tokyo and Seoul to acquire nuclear weapons, was asked if his views had shifted, given the surging tensions on the Korean Peninsula. “We say all options are on the table, but we cannot predict the future,” Tillerson replied. “So we do think it is important that everyone in the region has a clear understanding that circumstances could evolve to the point that for mutual deterrence reasons, we might have to consider that.” Still, Tillerson said that there were “a lot of steps and a lot of distance between now and a time that we would have to make a decision like that.” [Japanese remilitarisation] [Threat] [Pretext] [Nuclearisation] [Tillerson]
• Japan's five futures
  March 16, 2017 If Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo wakes up these days with an extra bounce in his step, it’s with good reason. He has overtaken Nakasone Yasuhiro to become the sixth longest serving prime minister in Japanese history, and he will soon pass Koizumi Junichiro, who set the standard in the post-Cold War era. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) just agreed to revise party rules to extend the maximum presidential tenure to three consecutive three-year terms for a total of nine years. (The previous limit was two.) If Abe completes a full third term, he will become Japan’s longest serving prime minister ever. Changing the rules is a smart move. While in office, Abe built and cemented his party’s parliamentary majority, bringing stability to a political system that was marked by uncertainty and hobbled by ineffectual leaders. The economy has regained its footing, with growth on the upswing, unemployment shrinking, and business confidence surging. Abe has set the standard for a good working relationship with US President Donald Trump and reduced tensions (somewhat) with Beijing and Seoul (although neither relationship can be counted on to continue its current path untended). He has made good on his promise to secure Japan’s place among the first tier of nations and to make it a force to be reckoned with in international relations. [Abe Shinzo]
• Towards an Asia-Pacific ‘Depopulation Dividend’ in the 21st Century: Regional Growth and Shrinkage in Japan and New Zealand
  Peter Matanle March 15, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 6 | Number 5 Abstract Japan is shrinking. Current projections indicate a population decrease of around one quarter by mid-century. Depopulation is potentially good news, providing opportunities for reconfiguring living conditions and alleviating human-environmental pressures. Nevertheless, ageing and depopulation have outcomes that require adjustment. One of these is spatial inequalities, which have been accelerating since the 1990s. Japan is the Asia-Pacific’s pioneer ageing and shrinking society. In East Asia both China and South Korea are ageing and expected to begin shrinking soon. Even high immigration Anglophone countries such as New Zealand are experiencing post-growth demographic processes at subnational level. Japan’s significance is in how adaptive responses there inform prospects for others as they experience their own post-growth pathways. This article presents case studies of Sado Island in Japan and New Zealand’s South Island in a comparative qualitative analysis of rural agency under population decline. Overall, I contend there is potential for benefitting from demographic shrinkage – what I term a ‘depopulation dividend’ – and for rural regions in the Asia-Pacific to progress towards a sustainable post-growth economy and society. [Demographics] [Ageing society] [NZ]
• The “Japan Is Great!” Boom, Historical Revisionism, and the Government
  Tomomi Yamaguchi March 15, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 6 | Number 3 This is the first of a two-part article. Part two, entitled “The National Story of ‘Japan Is Great’” by Hayakawa Tadanori, is available here. Precis: As the Tokyo Shimbun reported in its recent article, the expression “Japan Is Great!” and a distinctive nationalistic sentiment associated with it flood the mass media in Japan today. Journalists and television personalities praise Japan ad nauseam. Hayakawa Tadanori is an editor and writer who has extensively covered this “Japan Is Great” phenomenon. Analyzing issues surrounding nationalism and propaganda both in pre-war and contemporary Japan, he examines topics ranging from patriotic mobilization in pre-war and war-time Japan to post-war propaganda promoting nuclear energy. His most recent book, The Dystopia of “Japan Is Great”: The Genealogy of Singing One's Own Praises in Wartime (“Nihon sugoi” no disutopia: senjika jiga jisan no keifu, Seikyusha, 2016) analyzes “precursors to the current ‘Japan Is Great!’ discourse” in publications between 1925 and 1945. [Nationalism]
• The Story of the Nation: “Japan Is Great”
  Hayakawa Tadanori Translation by Joseph Essertier March 15, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 6 | Number 4 This is the second of a two-part article. Part one, entitled “The ‘Japan Is Great!’ Boom, Historical Revisionism, and the Government” by Tomomi Yamaguchi, is available here. Precis: What I refer to as “Japan-Is-Great” materials are “consciousness products” (Bewusstseins waren) in which “Japan” and “Japanese people” are praised and held out as special for their wonderful historical, cultural, or ethical qualities, and as excellent on a global scale.1 This class of products has now spread through the Japanese media ranging from books, magazines, and mooks; to television, radio, and government-sponsored programs; and furthermore, to human resources seminars and various types of courses on culture. Most notably, “Japan-Is-Great” variety shows have been produced at the public broadcaster NHK and at almost all private television stations, so many people have seen or heard their self-praising frolicking. It is striking that almost all stations started airing these programs between 2012 and 2014, coinciding with Abe Shinzo’s second term and the “Cool Japan” strategic formulation (2012) advanced by that administration. [Nationalism]
• Disputed deals with Japan could be discarded
  Posted : 2017-03-10 17:14 Updated : 2017-03-10 22:13 By Rachel Lee Calls are expected to mount for reconsideration of former President Park Geun-hye's controversial policies following her removal from power, Friday. They include the county's sex slavery deal with Japan, which has drawn strong protests from victims. In accordance with the agreement in 2015 to resolve disputes over Tokyo's sexual enslavement of Korean women during World War II, Japan offered 1 billion yen ($8.3 million) to give aid to the surviving victims of wartime sex slavery. But it still has faced strong objections from opposition parties and civic groups, arguing that Tokyo has yet to offer a sincere apology for its wrongdoings conducted during the 1910-1945 colonial rule of Korea. The country's leading presidential contenders, including Moon Jae-in from the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) and Seongnam Mayor Lee Jae-myung, have called for a reassessment of the accord. The General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) with Tokyo is one of the Park administration's key policies that is likely to be reviewed. The military intelligence-sharing pact — signed in November last year — has stirred up a strong backlash from opposition parties and civic groups, who accused the Park government of pushing for it despite the then growing calls for Park to step aside from all state affairs due to the corruption scandal involving Park and her long-time friend Choi Soon-sil. They also blamed the current government for unilaterally striking the deal without considering public sentiment against Japan's unrepentant views towards its atrocities before and during World War II. Seoul and Tokyo resumed the controversial talks in November last year after a four-year hiatus, and it took less than a month to conclude the deal. [Park Geun-hye] [Comfort women]
• Shun Medoruma and In the Woods of Memory
  19 April 1945 Shun Medoruma won Japan’s coveted Akutagawa Prize in 1997 for “Suiteki” [Droplets], a short story praised for its use of magic realism and literary sophistication. Since then, he has won many other literary prizes, and his works have been the focus of books of literary criticism and analysis, both in Japanese and in English.1 Medoruma has also been in the news for his political activism, especially his participation in the protests against construction of the new US military base in Henoko. He was arrested on April 1, 2016, when he paddled his canoe into a restricted area off the coast of Camp Schwab as part of the protest. [Okinawa] [1945] [Rape] [Occupation]

---

Return to top of page
FEBRUARY 2017

• Forget sanctions, reining in Pyongyang needs a new approach
  North Korea has developed nuclear weapons capability in spite of its economic isolation. Radical new strategies should be considered By Lully Miura February 14, 2017 5:04 AM (UTC+8) North Korea has launched its first ballistic missile since the start of Donald’s Trump’s presidency, just as Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visited the US to shore up support for the alliance between the two countries. The move led to a joint statement by the US and Japanese heads of state condemning the missile test. The US has reportedly been reviewing its policy on North Korea, and in his inaugural visit to East Asia earlier in February, US Defense Secretary James Mattis reassured allies that use of nuclear weapons by North Korea would lead to an “overwhelming” response from the US. Clearly, all that has not deterred Pyongyang. The question now is what can be done in light of lessons from previous attempts to rein in the isolated state. The UN Security Council imposed new sanctions against North Korea in late November 2016, following repeated missile and nuclear tests. But such sanctions have had little effect due to their loose execution, mainly by China. The November resolution attempted to address some of the obvious loopholes in previous sanctions. Most notable was an attempt to cut North Korea’s coal exports by about half. This was an approach the international community tried with Iran, with the same aim of curbing its nuclear ambitions. Despite its lack of popularity in US domestic politics, the Iran deal is seen as a success case in diplomatic circles. At the very least, the international community was able to buy time before Iran became fully nuclear-armed. North Korea’s situation is quite different. In the 20-plus years since the state’s nuclear ambitions became clear, very little progress has been made. North Korea is no longer attempting to create nuclear weapons – it has them. [US NK policy] [Nuclearisation] [Japan NK]
• Sharing the wealth to melt the ice: Japan and Russia
  by Masato Kamikubo Masato Kamikubo (masatok@fc.ritsumei.ac.jp) is Professor at the Graduate School of Policy Science, Ritsumeikan University, Japan. Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo had a two-day summit meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Dec. 15-16, 2016, where they agreed to 80 items in an eight-point plan for Japan-Russia economic cooperation. No progress was made regarding the territorial dispute over the four islands seized by Russia from Japan at the end of World War II. Despite this seemingly one-sided arrangement, economic cooperation between Japan and Russia should be pursued, since Russia has long sought Japanese cooperative support for its Far East development, and Japan needs to strengthen its relationship with Russia to increase its security. In the long-term, Japanese investment may also generate the trust and goodwill necessary for both sides to reach a deal on their territorial dispute. There are three reasons why Russia may want to cooperate with Japan. The first is the fragile state of its economy. Russia depends on the export of oil and natural gas, and a drop in prices would lead directly to a decrease in Russian economic strength. In fact, the current long-term drop in crude oil prices has significantly harmed the Russian economy. Second, risks inherent in the natural gas and pipeline arrangements with Europe have increased. Conventional theory holds that Russia, a natural gas supplying country, should have an advantageous position vis-a-vis the EU, a large gas consumer. However, if a supplier takes on fixed business partners out of necessity, it loses income if pipelines stop operating. At the same time, consumers can always find a substitute for natural gas (e.g., oil, coal, nuclear power or new energy sources) in the long term. Thus, it is not possible for a supplier country to use natural gas as a negotiating point. In fact, since the Ukraine crisis, Russia has been unable to leverage its pipelines in negotiations. The third weakness is Russia’s relationship with China. [Japan Russia]
• Japanese media spreading questionable reports on Kim Jong-nam’s death
  Posted on : Feb.18,2017 14:38 KST Shoddy reporting fuelled by antipathy toward North Korea and competition to report on it The Japanese media counts scrupulous reporting based on careful confirmation of the facts as one of its strengths - in every case but one. The exception is its reporting when it comes to “enemy state” North Korea. Since the death of former North Korean leader Kim Jong-il’s oldest son Jong-nam on Feb. 13, the Japanese media has come out with a number of false and unreliably sourced reports. Following reports of Kim Jong-nam’s unexpected killing the day before, Japan’s Kyodo News Agency reported on the morning of Feb. 15 that two women who had apparently taken part in the assassination “may already be dead,” citing a Japanese government official. Coming amid speculation that Pyongyang was likely to have been responsible for Kim’s death, the report set off shock waves in both Japan and South Korea. In addition to feeding suspicions that the murder was done by North Korean agents, the report had the effect of making the Pyongyang regime appear like something out of a spy movie - ruthless enough to eliminate its own agents after they performed their mission. But the report ended up proved false that afternoon with the arrest by Malaysian police of one suspect, a 29-year-old Vietnamese woman named Doan Thi Huong. In a piece published just after the arrest of a second suspect at around 11:50 am on Feb. 16, Kyodo reported that the woman “had a South Korean passport.” Numerous South Korean news outlets rushed to quote the agency, only to have it correct the piece less than hour later to identify the suspect as being an Indonesian national. [Kim Jong Nam] [Media]
• Environmental Contamination at USMC bases on Okinawa
  Jon Mitchell February 15, 2017 Since 2002, at least 270 environmental accidents on U.S. Marine Corps bases on Okinawa have contaminated land and local waterways but, until now, almost none of these incidents has been made public. U.S. Marine internal reports highlight serious flaws in training and suggest that the lessons of past accidents have not been effectively implemented. Moreover, recent USMC guidelines order service members not to inform Japanese authorities of accidents deemed “politically sensitive”, raising concerns that many incidents may have gone unreported. [Okinawa] [Bases] [Pollution]
• Hereditary politicians: What do Park Geun-hye and Shinzo Abe have in common?
  Posted on : Feb.8,2017 16:34 KST New book by independent journalist tracks Japanese PM’s efforts to undo the country’s pacifist Constitution Osamu Aoki, an independent journalist and author of “Three Generations of Abe” (by Gil Yun-hyung, Tokyo correspondent) What kind of person is Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who is fundamentally dismantling the postwar Japanese system that was built during the 70-plus years since its defeat in World War II? “Three Generations of Abe,” which was published last month by Osamu Aoki, 50, an independent journalist and a former reporter with Japan‘s Kyodo News, is a book that seeks an answer to this simple yet important question. By enacting and revising security legislation to allow Japan to exercise the right to collective self-defense (which was rejected by previous Japanese governments) and now by attempting to revise the country’s Peace Constitution, Abe has been rattling postwar Japan’s traditions and institutions to their very core. If Abe maintains his current supremacy in the Liberal Democratic Party, he is expected to remain prime minister through Sep. 2021, making him the longest-serving prime minister in the postwar period, even longer than his great uncle, Eisaku Sato (2,798 days). [Abe Shinzo] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• Trump: U.S.-Japan Alliance Is Foundation for Peace in East Asian Region
  VOA News February 11, 2017 08:45 President Donald Trump said Friday the friendship between the U.S. and Japan is "very, very deep" and declared an alliance between the two countries is a cornerstone of peace in the East Asian region. "We are committed to the security of Japan and all areas under its administrative control and to further strengthening our very crucial alliance," Trump told reporters at a White House news conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Abe said he and Trump have reached agreement on a new framework for economic talks and the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal will be among the topics of discussions. Trump said any trading relationship between the two countries must be "free, fair and reciprocal." . Japan has been concerned about the impact Trump's decision to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement, as well as "America First" strategy, would have on Asia. Abe expressed hope of developing a joint economic stimulus package that could create thousands of U.S. jobs through private and public investments in infrastructure. The two leaders began two days of talks at the White House Friday morning that provide them with opportunities to reinforce a long-established security treaty and bolster their economic relationship. Trump, Abe and their wives will fly to Palm Beach, Florida, Friday afternoon for a weekend stay at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate. The two-day summit is the most time Trump has spent with a foreign leader since he became president on January 20. It is Trump's second face-to-face meeting with a key ally after hosting British Prime Minister Theresa May in Washington two weeks ago. The Trump administration set a positive tone for the weekend summit by saying before Abe's arrival at the White House that Trump is committed to resisting any unilateral declarations that would threaten Japan's authority over disputed islands in the East China Sea. At the news conference, Trump reaffirmed that commitment, as well as one ensuring safety in the region. "We will work together to promote our shared interests... including freedom of navigation and defending against the North Korean missile and nuclear threat, both of which I consider a very, very high priority," he said. Japan's concerns about Trump's campaign promise to get Japan and other U.S. allies to pay more for their own defense were allayed somewhat by Defense Secretary James Mattis during a visit last week to Japan and South Korea. Trump's meeting with Japan's prime minister occurs as the new U.S. administration appears to be adopting a more traditional U.S. policy toward Asia that features consolidating alliances and collaboration with China. Late Thursday, Trump reaffirmed America's long-standing "One China" policy in a telephone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping. [US Japan alliance] [China confrontation] [{Sidelined]
• “Japan is Great”
  Shirona Masakazu and Ikeda Teiichi Translation by Joseph Essertier Introduction by Nakano Koichi February 1, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 3 | Number 4 The original Japanese version appears at the end of this article. Introduction While it is important to note the eerie similarity of the “Japan is great” boom in the media today with that of the 1930s, as this article does, it also bears emphasizing that this is hardly a uniquely Japanese phenomenon. As the following article indicates, while the self-congratulatory praise of Japan by the Japanese media was temporarily dormant in the postwar period, it energetically re-emerged during the 1990s and since then, has become more and more vociferous. But this increase in praise has not come about merely as a spontaneous reaction to the decline of self-confidence in the aftermath of the collapse of the bubble economy. The reassertion of national pride and identity by the Japanese has also been actively encouraged as healthy and desirable by the United States. As the Cold War came to an end, Washington pressured Japan to shake off its postwar self-constraints and project its influence and political power (even its military power) in international affairs more forcefully. This was demanded of Japan in order to make it better serve the goals of American foreign policy. (e.g. Michael Green’s “Japan Is Back: Why Tokyo's New Assertiveness Is Good for Washington”). [Japanese remilitarisation]
• A Japanese Crime Thriller in Which Crime Is the Least of It
  By MOTOKO RICHFEB. 2, 2017 Hideo Yokoyama at home in Japan. His thriller “Six Four” will be released in the United States on Tuesday. Credit Kentaro Takahashi for The New York Times ISESAKI, Japan — Hideo Yokoyama is one of Japan’s most popular crime novelists. Yet he regards the crime as the least interesting part of the stories he tells. “Usually, in a mystery or thriller, the main character is the detective, and the crime is the main ingredient,” said Mr. Yokoyama during an interview in the home he shares with his wife, Fumie, in a quiet residential neighborhood about 75 miles northwest of central Tokyo. “But is that really a special thing for the detective? It’s not a big deal for the detective.” Instead, Mr. Yokoyama, 60, speaking through an interpreter, said he is interested in the psychology and social dynamics of characters who happen to be affected by crime. In the case of “Six Four,” his 15th novel and the first to be translated into English, the main character, Yoshinobu Mikami, is not a detective but a police department spokesman ensnared in a 14-year-old unsolved kidnapping case while his own teenage daughter has gone missing.
• Survey: 72% of Japanese support retaliation over Busan comfort woman statue
  Posted on : Jan.31,2017 17:30 KST Public opinion has also shifted on question of expecting a deterioration of relations with US under Trump A public opinion poll has found that a majority of Japanese people expect Japan-US relations to deteriorate due to Donald Trump becoming US president. The same poll found that seven out of ten Japanese people support retaliation measures in response to the setting up of a comfort woman statue in Busan. The survey was published by Japan’s Nihon Geiza Simbun newspaper on Jan. 30. In regard to South Korea-Japan relations, the survey showed that about 72% of those surveyed supported retaliation measures taken against the South Korean government by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe after a new comfort woman statue was set up in front of the Japanese consulate in Busan at the end of last year. Only 18% of those surveyed did not support the measures. [Comfort Women] [Japan SK] [Public opinion]

---

Return to top of page
JANUARY 2017

• Japan’s Iwakuni becoming biggest US military base in East Asia
  Posted on : Jan.30,2017 13:39 KST Some residents opposing expansion of base in the political hometown of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe Standing atop an embankment with a good view of the runway of Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni at 10 am on Jan. 21, Akiko Onishi, 72, a nine-term member of the Iwakuni city council, pointed in the direction of the base and began to explain: “This is Saturday, which is a day off for the US military. It doesn’t look like any extra F-35Bs will be dispatched today. On the afternoon of Jan. 18, when the first two arrived, everyone was up here taking pictures,” Onishi said. [Bases] [Japan] [China confrontation]
• Mr. Abe's opportunity
  by Brad Glosserman Brad Glosserman (brad@pacforum.org) is executive director of Pacific Forum CSIS. Japan is nervous about the Trump presidency. The economic, foreign, and national security policies that the new president has said he will pursue challenge and threaten to upend verities that have guided Tokyo’s thinking in these areas for years. Still, the Trump presidency should be seen as an opportunity for Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, rather than a threat. Abe can use the Trump agenda to advance many of his own priorities and in so doing burnish his image as a regional and world leader, along with that of his country, and protect the international order that has served Japan, the US, and other countries so well. Japanese have many reasons to worry about Trump’s policies. [Abe Shinzo] [Trump] [US Japan Alliance] [Tribute]
• Encouraging Japan to Go Nuclear Won’t Denuclearize North Korea
  By Daniel Bob 24 January 2017 During his Presidential campaign, Donald Trump said that a nuclear-armed Japan might not be a “bad thing” for the United States “because of the threat of North Korea.” In a recent op-ed, Charles Krauthammer seemed to agree, advising the incoming administration to declare that the United States should no longer oppose Japan’s acquisition of nuclear weapons. He argued that “the Chinese have many nightmares, none worse than a nuclear-armed Japan,” and China can “halt” the North Korean nuclear weapons program. Both are wrong: a nuclear-armed Japan would endanger American—and Japanese—security interests, while only reinforcing North Korea’s determination to keep its nuclear weapons as the key to its survival. [Japanese nuclearisation] [Japanese remilitarisation]
• [News analysis] In policy speech, Japan’s Abe moves closer to Constitutional amendment
  Posted on : Jan.21,2017 15:05 KST To make Japan a country that can legally wage war, Abe will likely have to move in two stages During his New Year’s policy speech before the Japanese Diet on Jan. 20, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe underscored his commitment to revising the country’s “Peace Constitution.” Abe applied the new phrase of “our bilateral international commitments until now” to South Korea, which appears to express wariness about recent discussion inside South Korea about renegotiating the comfort women agreement with Japan. “This is the 70th anniversary of the enforcement of the [Japanese] Constitution,” Abe said during his policy speech on Jan. 20. “We need to deepen concrete discussion in the Constitutional review commission in the House of Representatives to propose a plan to the people about how we will move into the next 70 years.” [Japanese remilitarisation] [Abe Shinzo] [Constitution]
• Japan says isle name on 2018 Olympic website 'unacceptable."
  FILE - In this April 23, 2014, file photo, U.S. Ambassador to Japan Caroline Kennedy, left, shakes hands with Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida after exchanging the documents to extend the agreement on cooperation in research and development in science and technology between the two countries in Tokyo. Kennedy is stepping down Wednesday, Jan. 18, 2017 after three years as U.S. ambassador to Japan, where she was welcomed like a celebrity and worked to deepen the U.S.-Japan relationship despite regular flare-ups over American military bases on the southern island of Okinawa. The Associated Press TOKYO — Japan's Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida says it is "unacceptable" that the official website for the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics refers to disputed isles in the Sea of Japan under the South Korean name "Dokdo." The website introduces the islets by saying, "Dokdo holds a special place in the hearts of Koreans as they hold pride in defending Korea's easternmost reached territory." Japan, which calls the island Takeshima, says it has historical evidence backing its sovereignty since at least the 17th century. South Korea has countered that it has far older historical evidence that the islets it calls Dokdo are theirs. The website also refers to the waters which Japan calls Sea of Japan under the South Korean name, "East Sea." "It is unacceptable in light of our country's stance over the sovereignty of Takeshima and over the naming of the Sea of Japan," Kshida said. "It goes against the Olympic Charter which calls for mutual understanding and opposes the political use of sports." [Japan SK] [Territorial disputes] [Olympics]
• The Japanese State versus the People of Okinawa: Rolling Arrests and Prolonged and Punitive Detention
  Gavan McCormack and Sandi Aritza January 15, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 2 | Number 4 1.Gavan McCormack, “Yamashiro Hiroji and the Okinawan Anti-Base Struggle” 2.“Emergency Statement by 41 Criminal Law Scholars Demanding the Release of Yamashiro Hiroji,” Yamashiro Hiroji and the Okinawan Anti-Base Struggle Gavan McCormack “If Takae and Henoko can be stopped, Japan will change. If they cannot be stopped then there is no future, either for Okinawa or for Japan.”1 Henoko, Takae, and Yamashiro Hiroji For anyone who has spent any time on the front lines of the protracted resistance struggle by the people of Okinawa against construction of new bases for the Marine Corps at Henoko and Takae, one indelible impression is likely to be the performances of the master choreographer of the resistance, Yamashiro Hiroji. Conducting the assembled citizens day after day, month after month, in song, dance, and debate, this retired (64 year old) public servant has seemed to be a natural leader of the struggle to delay or prevent construction of the projected new bases for the Marine Corps at Henoko, adjacent to the existing Camp Schwab base on Oura Bay, and in the “Northern Training Area” in the Yambaru forest at Takae.2 At Henoko, the resistance has managed to hold off the base construction so that major works initially planned in 1996 have yet to begin (although the state, following a Supreme Court judgment in its favour in December 2016, appears determined to start work in January 2017). [Okinawa] [Bases] [Protest]
• Comfort women were Japan's shocking human rights violations: Lippert
  By Oh Young-jin, Rachel Lee Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe may finally feel regret over his repeated attempts to whitewash his country's wartime crimes such as sexual slavery of women, many of whom were Korean girls conscripted and forced to serve imperial soldiers. In Hiroshima and later in Hawaii, Abe has used outgoing U.S. President Barack Obama as a kind of prop to legitimize post-war Japan's shirking of responsibility for its World War II atrocities. The Japanese leader's charade was dismissed by Mark Lippert, Obama's protege and the U.S. ambassador to Korea for more than two years. Lippert confirmed the comfort women as a "shocking" example of "human rights violations" that Obama described during his April 2014 visit to Seoul. "It underscores the way that the United States feels about the issue," Lippert said during an interview with The Korea Times and the Hankook Ilbo at his residence Tuesday, when asked whether he still backed Obama's declaration. "We view this historical issue as very important." He denied allegations that the Dec. 28, 2015, agreement between Seoul and Tokyo to settle the sex slave issue was a result of U.S. pressure, saying, "We don't mediate and we don't pressure for an outcome." [Comfort women] [Lippert] [US dominance] [Sidelined]
• On the Latest Tension around the Yasukuni Shrine
  Konstantin Asmolov
  On December 29, 2016, the government of the Republic of Korea expressed its vehement protest to the Japanese authorities about the visit made by the Minister of Defense of Japan, Tomomi Inada, to the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo. The indignation was caused not only by the visit itself but by the Minister’s statement during the visit to the temple that “any state can honour the memory of those who gave their lives for their country.” According to the official statement made by the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Seoul “cannot but regret the fact that one of the key political figures of Japan visited the Yasukuni Shrine, which glorifies colonialism and aggression, and honours war criminals.” The document also notes that “Japan may only restore confidence and self-respect on the part of neighbouring countries and the international community if the Japanese leaders are able to interpret history correctly, reconsider its actions, and sincerely repent” its crimes committed in the past. The Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Korea expressed similar condemnation, and the Consul Ambassador of Japan’s Embassy in Seoul was called to the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs where he received a formal protest. [Yasukuni]
• Conservative Japanese policy institute calls for ability to attack North Korean missile bases
  Posted on : Jan.14,2017 15:41 KST Institute for International Policy Studies also seeking increase in Japan’s defense budget A policy institute representing the Japanese conservative establishment has asked the Japanese government to acquire the ability to directly attack North Korean missile bases and to approve a major increase in the country’s defense budget. During a press conference held on Jan. 12, a committee that researches Japan’s alliance with the US at the Institute for International Policy Studies (chaired by former Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone) released a report about the diplomatic and security policies that Japan should pursue as it enters a new period ushered in by the inauguration of Donald Trump as US president. Established in June 1988, the institute has proposed policies in the areas of foreign policy and security to the government from the perspective of Japanese conservatives. Having already acquired the right to collective self-defense, Japan’s conservatives (the support base for the administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe) have apparently set their sights on acquiring the ability to launch direct strikes on North Korea. [Japanese remilitarisation] [Threat] [Pretext]
• All frontrunners for next presidency in favor of renegotiating comfort women agreement
  Posted on : Jan.11,2017 16:03 KST Next president will inherit a number of diplomatic issues, including Dec. 28 agreement and THAAD With Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn making his first official remarks as acting president on Jan. 10 on the issue of South Korea’s dispute with Japan, stating that “it’s advisable to refrain from words or actions that could aggravate the situation,” attention is shifting to the approaches being taken to South Korea and Japan’s Dec. 28 comfort women agreement by the leading candidates in the presidential election. The candidates who are preparing for an early presidential election will have numerous diplomatic crises to deal with, including not only the Dec. 28, 2015 comfort women agreement but also conflict with China over the THAAD missile defense system. For the most part, the main candidates have committed themselves to repeal, or at least renegotiate, the Dec. 28 agreement. Starting with the candidates from the opposition parties, Moon Jae-in, the former leader of the Minjoo Party who is leading in recent polls, has described the Dec. 28 agreement as “a good example of deep-rooted problems with our foreign policy” and has expressed the need to renegotiate the agreement. “What Japan needs to do is to acknowledge its legal responsibility and to make an official apology. We need new negotiations that will make this clear,” Moon maintains. South Chungcheong Province governor Ahn Hee-jung is also calling for the agreement to be renegotiated. [Comfort women] [Election17]
• [Analysis] Comfort women agreement: a diplomatic debacle in three acts
  Posted on : Jan.10,2017 16:50 KST Yasumasa Nagamine, Japan’s ambassador to South Korea, arrives back from Japan at Gimpo Airport on Jan. 9, after he and the general consul in Busan were recalled due to the setting up of a comfort woman statue in Busan. Nagamine told reporters that he found the statue “very regrettable.” (Yonhap News) Fallout from Park Geun-hye government’s blunders will hang over the next South Korean administration The Dec. 28, 2015 agreement about the comfort women issue by the governments of South Korea and Japan - which has led to a diplomatic catastrophe - was one of a handful of major diplomatic ventures that South Korea pursued on its own since its liberation from Japanese colonial rule occupation. The dispute between the administrations of South Korean President Park Geun-hye and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe over the comfort women has unfolded in three acts. [Comfort women]
• Abe asks Seoul to choose between implementation and confrontation
  Posted on : Jan.9,2017 17:22 KST Two countries at odds over comfort women statues and implementation of Dec. agreement The remarks that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe made about the Dec. 28 comfort women agreement on Japan’s public broadcaster NHK on Jan. 8 appear to give the next South Korean government just two options: implementing the agreement or provoking a full-fledged diplomatic confrontation with Japan. “We confirmed that the comfort women agreement reached on Dec. 28, 2015 was a final and irreversible agreement. Japan has already faithfully carried out its responsibility by donating 1 billion yen (US$8.54 million). Now South Korea needs to show its sincerity,” Abe said on Jan. 8. “This agreement must be carried out even if a new party comes to power [in South Korea]. This is a question of a country’s credibility,” Abe added, aiming the remarks not only at the administration of President Park Geun-hye, his partner in the agreement, but also at the next South Korean administration. [Comfort women]
• US maintains Dec. 28 agreement an “important milestone toward reconciliation”
  Posted on : Jan.9,2017 17:19 KST State Department spokesperson comments could be interpreted as lending support to Japan While the US government avoided making a direct reference to the “retributive measures” taken by Japan in response to the setting up of a comfort woman statue in Busan, it did appear to be deliberately stressing the significance of the Dec. 28 comfort women agreement. During the regular press briefing on Jan. 6, US State Department spokesperson John Kirby responded to a question he received about the comfort woman statue in Busan as follows: “Back in December [. . .] of 2015, both the governments of Japan and Korea [. . .] showed courage and vision in announcing an agreement regarding this sensitive historical legacy issue, which we believe was an important milestone toward reconciliation.” [Comfort women] [US dominance] [Sidelined]
• Japan's top diplomats in Seoul to return home in protest of 'comfort women' statue
  Japan's top diplomats in South Korea will return home this week in protest of a new statue recently set up in Busan to remember Korean victims of Japan's wartime sex slavery, diplomatic sources said Sunday. Japanese Ambassador to South Korea Yasumasa Nagamine plans to leave for Tokyo via Gimpo International Airport in Seoul on Monday morning, while the Japanese consul general in Busan, Yasuhiro Morimoto, will also return to Japan the same day. Last week, Japan decided to temporarily call in its top diplomats in South Korea, in protest against the statue installed at the end of last year by a civic group in front of its Consulate General building in the southern port city of Busan. Tokyo also announced a halt to the ongoing negotiation on a currency swap agreement between the two countries and the postponement of a high-level cooperation meeting. [Comfort women] [Japan SK]
• Japan’s hard-line response on comfort woman statue complicates bilateral ties
  Posted on : Jan.7,2017 15:21 KST Recalling of ambassador over statue in Busan could cause worsening of S. Korean public opinion The Japanese government’s retaliatory measures on Jan. 6 in response to the setting up of a comfort woman statue in front of its consulate in Busan are being seen as highly unusual. Coming just a week after the statue was set up, they are intense enough to have even many in Japan viewing them as hard-line. In a press conference on Jan. 6 to announce the measures, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga put less emphasis on the nature of the retaliatory measures than on Seoul’s “efforts to implement” the agreement reached with Tokyo on the comfort women issue on Dec. 28, 2015. For Suga’s announcement, the focus was not on Japan’s retaliation, but on South Korea’s need to honor the terms it agreed to. [Comfort women]
• [Editorial] Japan’s inappropriate measures, and the unjust Dec.28 agreement
  Posted on : Jan.7,2017 15:18 KST The Japanese government has recalled its ambassador to South Korea and its consul in Busan to protest the comfort women statue that was set up near the rear gate of the Japanese consulate in Busan. Recalling the ambassador and consul is a measure of almost unprecedented harshness. Japan also announced that it would suspend negotiations about a currency swap and delay high-level economic deliberations with South Korea. [Comfort women]
• Japan announces harsh “retaliatory measures” over comfort woman statue in Busan
  Posted on : Jan.7,2017 15:24 KST Hard-line response from Japan apparently motivated by concern that Dec. 28 agreement could be jeopardized The Japanese government announced tough “retaliatory measures” in response to the comfort woman statue that was recently set up in front of the Japanese consulate in Busan. As the candlelight rallies that brought on President Park Geun-hye’s impeachment stoke public demands for the revocation or renegotiation of South Korea’s Dec. 28, 2015, agreement with Japan about the comfort women, the “candlelight spirit” in South Korea and the hard-line stance of the administration of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe seem set for a head-on collision, with nothing to soften the impact. [Comfort women]
• Trump's Threat to Charge Japan More for U.S. Forces: Taoka Shunji says “Let them leave.”
  Taoka Shunji Introduction and translation by Steve Rabson January 1, 2017 Volume 15 | Issue 1 | Number 5 Ever since the end of America's Vietnam catastrophe, experts on both sides of the Pacific have sounded warnings about anachronistic, wasteful, and dangerously misguided U.S. military policies, seemingly perpetuated by inertia, in East Asia. Yet their recommendations are ignored and new policy initiatives thwarted. As a candidate for president in early 1975, Jimmy Carter advocated removing U.S. forces from South Korea. Of Carter’s meeting that year with researchers at the Brookings Institution, Senior Fellow Barry M. Blechman recalled, "I told Carter we should take out the nukes (nuclear weapons) right off and phase out the ground troops over four or five years. I said the most important reason was to avoid getting the U.S. involved with ground forces almost automatically in a new war which is, of course, why the South Koreans want them there." However, Major General John K. Singlaub, U.S. Forces Korea Chief of Staff at the time, publicly criticized Carter’s proposed withdrawal and CIA Director Stansfield Turner privately expressed misgivings.1 It was never implemented. [Okinawa] [US Japan Alliance] [Tribute] [Trump]

---

Return to top of page[.....] Return to Asian Geopolitics indexpage