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South Korea urges Japan to stop marring war apology

Posted on: Tuesday, 28 February 2006, 21:48 CST

SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun urged Japan on Wednesday to stop all actions that put its apology for its past war of aggression in doubt, saying Tokyo's neighbors were justifiably upset.

Japan's ties with South Korea and China have been strained over Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visits to Yasukuni war shrine and cabinet members' comments that critics say justify and embellish Japan's war of aggression.

"Japan has already apologized," Roh said in a speech marking a 1919 uprising in South Korea against Japanese colonial rule.

"We are objecting to actions that negate that apology," Roh said.

Japan colonized the Korean peninsula from 1910 until its defeat in World War Two in 1945. Many in South and North Korea and China see Japanese leaders' visits to Yasukuni shrine, where convicted war criminals are honored among its 2.5 million war dead, as deeply offensive.

Roh noted he had made a call a year ago for Japan to overcome its militarist legacy and make sincere efforts to improve ties with the South.

"But in the past year, with the shrine visits, distortion in history textbooks and the Tokto issue, nothing has changed much," he said.

South Korea has protested against Tokyo's approval of history textbooks that Seoul says whitewash atrocities committed in Korea, China and other parts of Asia.

South Korea and Japan are also locked in a territorial dispute over two rocky islets -- called Tokto in Korean and Takeshima in Japan and occupied by South Korea -- midway between the two countries.

"It is natural, when the situation is like this, for our people to believe Japan may be trying to justify its history of aggression and control and to return to the road of domination," Roh said.

Former Japanese Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama apologized for its colonial past in 1995 and Koizumi repeated it last year.

But Koizumi has said his annual visits to the shrine are to pray for peace and "a matter of the heart." He has also described outside criticism as abnormal.

Roh rejected the logic and said what counted was how neighboring countries that had been victimized felt and not what the Japanese leader said.

Japan needed to act with conscience and win the trust of the international community if it wanted to become a true world leader, Roh said.

South Korea's foreign ministry said earlier this week its commercial and cultural ties with Japan would not suffer despite its push for Japan to change over the history row.

Japan's top government spokesman Shinzo Abe said he had not yet heard the details of Roh's speech but noted there were 10,000 people involved in bilateral exchanges.

"I believe forward-looking relations will be to the benefit of both countries," he said. "I want President Roh to look carefully at Japan's protection of freedom, democracy and human rights and its efforts to bring peace to the world."

Source: REUTERS

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