Even in one of the presidential debates, Yoon ranked Japan second in terms of his priorities. His visit to former President Park Geun-hye on April 12, is also considered to be connected to his push for reconciliation with Japan.
South Korea and Japan signed two agreements ― on the wartime sex slavery issue in 2015 and the intelligence sharing issue (the General Security of Military Information Agreement, or GSOMIA) in 2016 during the Park administration.
Yoon has announced that he would honor the "final and irreversible" agreement on the comfort women issue and it would definitely please Japan in general and the Japanese prime minister in particular as Fumio Kishida was the foreign minister of Japan when the agreement was signed.
In an interview with the Washington Post on April 14, Yoon expressed his confidence that South Korea-Japan relations would "go well" during his term. He said that even though South Koreans have "traumatic memories of Japanese colonial rule," South Korea must "look forward in the future."
Yoon also connected South Korea-Japan relations with the improvement in trilateral relations between Seoul, Tokyo and Washington as well as bilateral Seoul-Washington relations.
Yoon's general foreign policy approach also appears to be closer to that of Japan. He has expressed that he would proactively remove all frictions from South Korea-U.S. relations and be more expressive against China's "assertive" behavior. It appears that he would harden South Korean approach toward North Korean nuclear-missile tests. These postures are definitely going to be appreciated by Japan.
Yoon's seven-member delegation is visiting Japan from April 24 to 28 to explore ways and means to improve relations with Japan. The delegation may have a meeting with the Japanese prime minister while there.
Until now, Japan has responded positively to Yoon's postures and Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said on April 18 that Japan will "seize this opportunity to communicate well with the new South Korean administration."
Thus, it appears quite probable that South Korea-Japan relations will improve during the Yoon administration. However, there are several obstacles in the form of historical, territorial and political disputes, which also must be stressed.
Most importantly, popular sentiment in South Korea remains unfavorable toward Japan. As an opinion poll by the Korea Economic Research Institute in May 2021 points out, only 16.7 percent of South Koreans feel friendly toward Japan.
In the recent past also there have been several instances when Japan's actions have not been appreciated in South Korea. For example, when Japan recommended a gold and silver mine complex on Sado Island for the 23 UNESCO World Heritage list in February 2022, South Korea became upset as the island is a site of wartime forced labor.
In late March, Japan released new history and geography textbooks, which claim that the Dokdo islets are part of Japanese territory and changed some expressions such as Japanese "coercion" to Japanese "mobilization" during the colonial period. Naturally, the South Korean government expressed its displeasure, yet Yoon decided to keep silent on the matter.
It's important to note that previous leaders of conservative parties also tried to reach out to Japan but because of popular backlash, they had to change their positions. For example, former President Lee Myung-bak was secretly negotiating GSOMIA with Japan but when the news leaked, the process stalled.
To overcome his image of being a pro-Japan leader, Lee visited Dokdo after the controversy. His successor, President Park, did sign the agreements on the sex slavery issue and GSOMIA but she then faced popular opposition in the country.
Anyway, throughout her term, South Korea and Japan did not have any direct, bilateral and exclusive summit and the last such summit was in 2011 when President Lee visited Japan.
The trade restrictions have further led both countries to drift away from each other in recent years. South Korea has gradually been substituting its reliance on Japan in terms of its imports of key semiconductor materials. In fact, by June 2021 South Korea's reliance on Japan for the top 100 industrial items needed for its economy had declined to just 25 percent.
Amid all these challenges, President-elect Yoon has to work for the improvement of South Korea-Japan relations, and it will not be an easy task. However, even if he is able to halt deterioration in bilateral relations, it will definitely be positive for both countries and the region.
The author (sandipmishra10@gmail.com) is associate professor at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India.