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| Prime Minister Lee Nak-yon speaks during a meeting for the Special Committee on Budget and Accounts at the National Assembly, Thursday. Yonhap |
By Jung Da-min
Prime Minister Lee Nak-yon denied Thursday media reports that Seoul had proposed a compromise to Tokyo on the issue of compensation for Koreans forced to work for Japanese companies during wartime, a key point of contention in ongoing trade and history disputes between the two countries.
Lee made the remarks at a meeting of the National Assembly Special Committee on Budget and Accounts following Japanese media reports that such a deal was discussed.
According the reports, former Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura held a press conference Tuesday in Tokyo after meeting with the Korean prime minister during his four-day stay in Seoul. He told reporters that Seoul had suggested the so-called 1(Japanese firms)+1(Korean firms)+α(Seoul) model, which entails the involvement of the Korean government in addition to the Japanese and Korean firms in compensating the surviving victims. It is an alteration from the 1(Japanese firms)+1(Korean firms) method Korea had proposed in June which was rejected by Japan.
The lawmaker of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and senior member of the Japan-South Korea Parliamentarians' Union reportedly elaborated that the latest proposal would have the Japanese firms carry out the 2018 Supreme Court ruling by first compensating the victim before being reimbursed by the Korean government so that the firms would not experience any actual financial loss.
But Prime Minister Lee and the government denied the reports, saying no such discussions occurred during his meeting with Kawamura. Lee said he had never thought of such a compromise deal nor talked about anything related to the apparent proposal. "I was surprised when I saw the media reports and called Secretary Kawamura to ask about it. [Kawamura] explained that the reports were wrong," Lee said.
Officials at Cheong Wa Dae and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs also said that there were no such discussions during the luncheon between Lee and Kawamura.
The media reports emerged amid rising concerns that without reaching an agreement on the compensation for the wartime forced laborers, the two sides will not be able to resolve other bilateral issues, such as the escalating row over trade and security.
Diplomatic sources have underlined the need for the two countries to strike a compromise on the compensation method. But Japan's rigid attitude in blaming Korea has made it difficult for the two countries to start negotiations on a compromise deal.
Japanese government officials continued to promote their position this week in the international community that Korea is at fault for violating international law by going against the 1965 normalization treaty.
Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono in his article published by Bloomberg on Wednesday claimed that Japan's recent strengthening of export control measures against South Korea is not related to wartime forced labor and said the issue was settled completely and finally through the 1965 conclusion by the two countries on "the Agreement on the Settlement of Problems concerning Property and Claims and on Economic Co-operation between Japan and the Republic of Korea."
Kono said that the South Korean Supreme Court decisions last year were in violation of the 1965 treaty.
"The Korean Supreme Court rendered a series of judgments against Japanese companies, ordering them to pay compensation to the former civilian workers. These judgments clearly violated the 1965 Agreement. Yet the Korean government has failed to take any concrete measures to remedy the situation," Kono wrote. "In effect, after more than 50 years, South Korea has unilaterally abrogated the pledges made by our two governments. This is the crux of the issue we face now. If an international agreement can be broken because of the domestic circumstances of one country, we will never be able to maintain stable international relations."
The South Korean government, however, views that the rights of individuals to claim the compensation are still valid despite the state-to-state treaty. South Korean and Japanese government officials are also at odds over the issue of the General Security of Military Information Agreement that is set to end November, over Seoul's recent decision not to renew it.
