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| President Moon Jae-in speaks during the U.N. Climate Change Conference COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, Tuesday (local time). Yonhap |
By Jung Da-min
With no meeting between President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida held during the former's visit to Glasgow, Scotland for the 26th U.N. Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) Monday and Tuesday (local time), attention is now being focusing on whether the two can meet to discuss the future of Korea-Japan relations.
The strained bilateral ties between Seoul and Tokyo have shown no signs of improving in recent years following the Korean Supreme Court's 2018 ruling that ordered Japanese companies to compensate surviving Korean victims of wartime forced laborer and following retaliatory tit-for-tat measures between the countries.
While Moon attended the COP summit Monday and Tuesday, and then headed to Hungary, Kishida arrived in the U.K., Tuesday, returned to Japan, Wednesday. On Tuesday, Kishida held meetings with his counterparts from the U.K. and Australia as well as those of other Asian countries including Vietnam, India, Sri Lanka and Mongolia. Kishida also held a brief meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden, but there was no such encounter with President Moon.
Jin Chang-soo, director of the center for Japanese Studies at the Sejong Institute, said there is little chance for Moon to sit down with Kishida for talks before he leaves office in May next year.
"For Japanese Prime Minister Kishida, he needs to prepare for the July 2022 House of Councillors (upper house) election, even though his Liberal Democratic Party won an outright majority in Japan's House of Representatives in Oct. 31 lower house election," Jin said.
"Kishida is urged to put policies into practice, which he had promised during election campaigning, such as financial distribution policy and COVID-19 measures. ... In this regard, Kishida is focused on domestic policies. In terms of diplomatic policy, the Japanese government is emphasizing its relations with the United States but it does not view that improving relations with Korea would bring any political benefits."
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| Japan's Prime Minister Fumio Kishida speaks during the U.N. Climate Change Conference COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, Tuesday (local time). AP-Yonhap |
Jin said the Japanese government will continue to stick with its earlier claim that the Korean government is violating international law by demanding further compensation for wartime forced laborers and sexual slavery victims, which the Japanese side sees as settled through the 1965 basic relations treaty between the countries.
"The Japanese side will wait until Korea's next presidential election slated for March and then decide whether to hold a meeting with the new leader of Korea, so there is little chance a summit will be held before then," Jin said.
Regarding this, Cheong Wa Dae said it will keep the door open for any dialogue with Japan.
The presidential office claimed it was just that the schedules of Moon and Kishida were different and it remains open to any possible form of talks with the Japanese government. But diplomatic watchers said it seems the Japanese government has no interest in holding any meeting with South Korea at the moment. They said diplomatic relations with South Korea is not a priority for the Kishida Cabinet, which has been committed to domestic politics since its inauguration in early October.
"I understand that Japanese Prime Minister Kishida's COP26 attendance was confirmed at the last moment and his stay in Glasgow was very short," a high-ranking Cheong Wa Dae official told reporters at the COP 26 summit, Wednesday (local time). "The leaders of Korea and Japan had different schedules at the big event where over 100 countries attended. … As President Moon said in a phone call to Kishida to congratulate his election as prime minister, Cheong Wa Dae remains committed to its stance that it will continue to work with the Japanese government for the future-oriented development of bilateral relations between the countries."
