Japan asks S. Korea for talks on asset seizure over wartime labor

TOKYO, Jan 9, 2019, Kyodo. Japan asked South Korea on Wednesday to begin talks after a South Korean district court approved a request to seize a Japanese steelmaker’s assets in the country in connection with the issue of wartime labor, reported the Kyodo News.

The request came after the district court said Tuesday it approved the seizure of local assets of Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp. for the company refusing to comply with an earlier court order to pay compensation to four South Koreans who were recognized as having been forced into labor during Japan’s 1910 to 1945 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.

Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Takeo Akiba made the request to South Korean Ambassador Lee Su Hoon, the Foreign Ministry said.

In Seoul, a spokesman for the office of President Moon Jae In commented only that the South Korean government will disclose its position on the Japanese move once the prime minister’s office, which is in charge of the matter, prepares one.

Lawyers representing the plaintiffs had requested in late December that the Pohang Branch of the Daegu District Court seize Nippon Steel’s shares in a joint venture with South Korean steelmaker POSCO.

Japan’s top government spokesman Yoshihide Suga described the court decision as “extremely regrettable” and said Tokyo “has taken the matter seriously.”

“The South Korean government has yet to take concrete steps despite Japan’s request to address the situation, which violates international law,” said Suga, the chief Cabinet secretary.

Tokyo maintains that the issue of compensation was settled “completely and finally” under an agreement to settle property claims signed alongside the 1965 Japan-South Korea basic relations treaty that established diplomatic ties.

Japan has said the South Korean rulings are “in breach of international law.”

Suga, who chaired a meeting of ministers, told government agencies to “closely cooperate with each other” in dealing with the South Korean court’s approval of the seizure, according to land minister Keiichi Ishii.

The bilateral agreement on settling property claims stipulates that any dispute regarding its interpretation and implementation shall be resolved, first of all, through diplomatic channels.

The talks, if realized, would be the first of their kind to be based on the pact, according to Japanese officials.

If the talks fall apart, Japan may seek to establish an arbitration panel, which is also stated in the accord, or eventually take the matter to the International Court of Justice.

Bilateral ties between the two Asian neighbors have rapidly deteriorated since the South Korean Supreme Court handed down the compensation order in late October.

Another similar ruling the following month ordered Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. to compensate two groups of South Koreans for similar reasons.