FOCUS: Japan, S. Korea Leaders Highlight Close Ties thru Interaction in Nara

Nara, Jan. 14 (Jiji Press)–Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and South Korean President Lee Jae-myung demonstrated their close relationship through a bilateral summit and a banquet in the city of Nara, the capital of the namesake prefecture in western Japan, on Tuesday. The two leaders had the third face-to-face contact since Takaichi took office last October. Apparently behind the frequent interactions between Takaichi and Lee, who was inaugurated last June, are a view on both sides that promoting close bilateral relations would benefit Tokyo and Seoul at a time when the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump is increasingly taking an inward-looking attitude and China is accelerating its hegemonic behavior. “Japan and South Korea should play their roles together for regional stability,” Takaichi said at the summit with Lee in Nara. In reply, the South Korean president said that cooperation between the two countries is very important. It is rare for a Japanese prime minister to welcome a foreign leader to a regional city. Takaichi was born in Nara Prefecture, and her House of Representatives constituency covers part of the city of Nara. A banner with a message reading “Welcome” in Korean was shown at the Nara city government building across from the hotel where the Takaichi-Lee summit was held. Nara is a sister city of Gyeongju, South Korea, where the two leaders held their first in-person meeting in October last year. At a joint press conference held after the Nara meeting, Takaichi emphasized her “friendship and relationship of trust” with Lee. After that, Takaichi, together with Lee, played her favorite drums to the tune of popular South Korean boy band BTS, entertaining the president, who had told the prime minister at their meeting last year that his dream was to play drums. The Takaichi-Lee interaction “bolstered the relationship of trust between Japan and South Korea,” a source close to the Japanese leader said. The Japanese and South Korean governments are trying to build rapport due to their concerns that Trump’s increasing focus on the Western Hemisphere, which includes the Americas, could lead to his administration reducing its engagement in the Eastern Hemisphere, including Asia. Possibly in anticipation of the United States’ decreasing presence in Asia, China is ramping up its economic coercion against Japan while applying military pressure on Taiwan, which Beijing regards as a renegade province and aims to integrate with its mainland. At the latest summit, Takaichi and Lee affirmed the importance of strategic cooperation among Japan, the United States and South Korea. A senior official of Japan’s Foreign Ministry said that the framework among the three countries is a tool to retain the United States. South Korea is on the same page with Japan. Lee held a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Jan. 5. Xi called on Lee to work together over history issues. Lee, however, declined the offer, saying that relations with Japan are also important, according to sources with access to the China-South Korea summit. Challenges still lie between Japan and South Korea, such as history issues and a territorial dispute over the Sea of Japan islands called Takeshima in Japan and Dokdo in South Korea. But Lee told Takaichi that it is crucial to minimize the negative effects, stressing the importance of appropriately managing the problems to prevent them from resurging. Takaichi and Lee confirmed that their countries will cooperate in DNA analyses of human bones discovered at the Chosei undersea coal mine in the city of Ube, Yamaguchi Prefecture, western Japan, last year. The bones may be those of people from the Korean Peninsula. In February 1942, during the Pacific War, part of World War II, a tunnel about 1 kilometer from the entrance of the mine, which was opened in 1914, collapsed and was flooded, claiming the lives of 47 Japanese workers and 136 from the Korean Peninsula. Lee told the joint press conference that there has been small but meaningful progress on past history and that the bilateral meeting was therefore of great significance. He added that he would like to express his gratitude for the special interest shown by Takaichi. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]