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Korea, Japan on collision course over compensation

By Song Sang-ho

Relations between Korea and Japan are likely to further worsen as Japanese companies are poised to ignore Korean courts’ rulings for compensation for wartime forced labor.

Three major Japanese economic organizations were preparing Wednesday for a statement reiterating that all compensation issues were settled under a bilateral normalization pact in 1965.

Japan’s Federation of Economic Organizations, Chamber of Commerce and Industry and Committee for Economic Development are sticking to their stance despite a series of rulings in recent years in favor of Koreans mobilized for forced labor at Japanese firms during the 1910-45 colonial period.

They are calling on the two countries’ governments and business circles to work to promptly address the controversial issue to prevent damage to bilateral investment and trade.

Japanese firms have long maintained that the bilateral deal between the Seoul and Tokyo governments covered individual victims’ right to claim compensation for their forced labor. Seoul believes that the right remains intact as the government-to-government deal does not settle all issues involving victims and private firms.

The statement is expected to further worsen bilateral ties, which have already been frayed due to Tokyo’s repeated claim to sovereignty over South Korea’s islets of Dokdo, and what Seoul sees as its distortion of historical facts and failure to adequately apologize to those forced into sexual servitude during World War II.

Seoul has begun exploring ways, albeit in a low-profile manner, to support the victims as local courts have offered legal grounds to pursue compensation from Japanese firms.

In May last year, the Supreme Court made a landmark decision in favor of nine plaintiffs, who have demanded compensation for their forced labor and mental and physical sufferings from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Nippon Steel Corp.

The top court said that Japanese courts’ hitherto rulings against victims could not be upheld as they were based on the premise that the mobilization for forced labor was legitimate during the colonial period. It stressed that the premise itself conflicted with Korea’s core constitutional values, which see the colonization as illegal.

Following this ruling, appellate courts in Seoul and Busan made decisions in July against two Japanese firms in question and demanded compensation for the plaintiffs.

Experts say should the two firms refuse to make amends, the process to forcibly take properties based in South Korea could proceed, which could deal a considerable blow to bilateral business ties.

According to the Seoul government, the number of Koreans who have reported their experience of forced labor from 2005 to 2008 has topped 220,000. Including their bereaved families, the figure is expected to reach 1 million, observers said.

The right to compensation is inherited by their families when they die. Scholars here claim that the number of Koreans forcibly mobilized by Japan from April 1938 until Korea was liberated in 1945 is around 8 million.

The different interpretations by Seoul and Tokyo of the 1965 deal have long been a diplomatically thorny issue. Many experts here argue that Japan should learn a lesson from Germany in its efforts to make amends to its wartime victims.

The normalization deal came at a time the South was in dire need of economic assistance from outside to spur its development while Japan needed to mend fences with neighboring countries to enhance its post-war status.

(sshluck@heraldcorp.com)