Foreign Minister presses Tokyo to make decision on forced labor issue

Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi (left) and South Korean Foreign Minister Park Jin (Ministry of Foreign Affairs)

South Korean Foreign Minister Park Jin met with his Japanese counterpart, urging Tokyo to make a “political decision” over wartime forced labor to mend ties soured by the long-running historical dispute, officials said Sunday.

Park held a talk with Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference in Germany on Saturday.

In the 35-minute meeting, Korea’s top diplomat called for Tokyo to decide on restitutions for Koreans forced to work for Japanese companies during World War II -- a key sticking point of discussions on repairing ties.

The key issues at the meeting were whether the Japanese companies Nippon Steel and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries -- who were ordered to directly compensate forced labor victims by a top Seoul court in 2018 -- would contribute to raising funds for them, and whether Japan would offer a sincere apology.

Following the Seoul-Tokyo talks, Park told a group of reporters that he had a “sufficient dialogue” about the “major issues of the dispute” with Hayashi over the feud.

“Now that we have understood each other’s positions (regarding the matter), what lies ahead are political decisions,” Park said.

The Korean government unveiled a plan in January to compensate victims of Japan’s wartime forced labor during its 1910-45 colonial rule in Korea through a public foundation, an alternative to Japanese firms' direct compensation to the victims.

However, the family members of the victims have refused the proposal, demanding a sincere apology from Japan and the direct participation of Japanese companies in the compensation process. Tokyo maintains that Japanese companies are not obligated to compensate victims of forced labor, citing a 1965 bilateral treaty to normalize diplomatic relations.

Last week, the two vice foreign ministers met in Washington to discuss historical disputes, but Japan showed little sign of budging on its stance -- refusing to abide by the 2018 top South Korean court ruling that ordered Japanese firms to compensate the victims directly.

After the meeting, South Korea’s First Vice Foreign Minister Cho Hyun-dong told reporters that the two sides are “still trying to come to a mutual understanding” over the thorny issue.