Korean President Yoon Meets with Japanese Prime Minister Kishida

Picture of President Yoon Suk-yeol (left) and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida during Korea-Japanese Summit. Photo: Kiyoshi Ota / Bloomberg

President Yoon Suk-yeol flew to Tokyo to meet Prime Minister Kishida on March 16th, which is the first official Korea-Japan summit in 12 years. This summit holds extreme significance for both countries as U.S.-China and U.S.-Russia tensions are reaching alarming levels alongside ever-increasing North Korean provocations.

The fact that it has been 12 years since a Korean President has been invited to Japan underlines the nature of Korean-Japanese relations. There are multiple factors that have contributed to such a deteriorating relationship for an extended period of time. The most significant factor is the tragic history of Japanese colonization and occupation of the Korean peninsula between 1910 to 1945, which involved beyond horrific measures implemented by the Japanese government as its means to occupy the Korean peninsula.

After the tragic occupation, both countries struggled to establish complete peace with each other as the Japanese government was reluctant to clearly admit their past actions while the Korean government demanded proper acknowledgement and official apology. 

Fortunately, it seemed like both countries found common ground when Prime Minister Abe delivered a personal apology to the Korean people for the horrific tragedy of the Japanese occupation in 2015 along with a reparation deal of $8.3 million for Japanese sexual assault on young Korean women who are regarded as “Comfort Women.”

Picture of President Moon and Prime Minister Abe. Photo: Kazuhiro Nogi / Bloomberg

However, since President Moon took hold of office in Korea, both countries’ hard-earned chance to restore ties quickly disappeared as President Moon and his Democratic Party were, and still are, mostly Anti-Japanese. 

President Moon and his party accused the 2015 deal to be flawed and this signaled the fall of an already brittle Korean-Japanese relationship. Later in Moon’s presidency, the Supreme Court of Korea ordered Mitsubishi for their usage of forced laborers, which caused the Japanese government to initiate a trade war with Korea by removing Korea from its trade whitelist. The tension between the two continued even after each country changed its leaders in recent years. 

Escalated tension in recent years adds to the significance of President Yoon’s determination to restore a favorable relationship with Japan. Despite continuously furious public opinion toward Japan, President Yoon risked his domestic support in an attempt to amend the relationship between Korea and Japan by making a third-party entity consisting of voluntary actors of mostly Korean companies to compensate for forced laborers instead of forcing the Korean Supreme Court’s decision.

Prime Minister Kishida, in return for President Yoon’s bold move, also made favorable moves. Kishida invited Korea for the next G7 meeting,invoked statements of remorse by past leaders on Japanese colonial rule, and had two more relaxed meetings in a more informal setting with omurice, one of Yoon’s nostalgic foods, being one of the menus.