Korea, Japan resume strategic talks

South Korea and Japan held a strategic dialogue in Tokyo on Wednesday for the first time in nearly two years to discuss an array of bilateral issues and North Korea's nuclear program, Seoul's foreign ministry said.

Seoul's First Vice Foreign Minister Cho Tae-yong met with his Japanese counterpart, Akitaka Saiki, for talks on pending bilateral, regional and global issues, including the situation on the Korean Peninsula, officials said.

The meeting comes as bilateral relations have been at their lowest ebb in recent years due to Japan's attempts to deny its wartime atrocities such as sex slavery and its territorial claims to South Korea's easternmost islets of Dokdo.

"Seoul-Tokyo ties should be based on a correct perception of history as well as mutual understanding and trust that could bring about future-oriented bilateral relations," Cho said during his opening remarks for the meeting.

He stressed that bilateral ties could only be developed by balancing these factors.

It marked the first Seoul-Tokyo strategic dialogue since South Korean President Park Geun-hye took office in February 2013. Such a meeting was last held in January last year.

The two countries had initially planned to hold such discussions in December last year, but the talks have been suspended since Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visited the controversial Yasukuni war shrine, considered a symbol of Japan's past militarism.

The meeting also comes as Abe proposed to hold a summit with President Park in the fall.

Abe conveyed his written offer to Park through former Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori, who visited Seoul earlier this month.

But Park stressed that Japan should show its sincere efforts first to resolve the issue of Korean victims of Tokyo's wartime sexual enslavement. She has shunned a bilateral summit with Abe since her inauguration, in response to Japan's policy moves that Seoul deems to be aggressively nationalistic.

South Korean Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se told a radio program Wednesday that conditions should be ripe for a bilateral summit, indicating that Seoul will not seek one just for the sake of dialogue.

Asked whether Japan's sincerity toward history issues is a prerequisite for a summit with Tokyo, Yun said, "That's the stance of the Seoul government."

The foreign minister called on Japan to come up with measures with sincerity that the victims of Japan's wartime sexual enslavement and the international community can fully accept.

The vice foreign minister also made similar remarks Tuesday.

"South Korea's stance (about a possible summit with Japan) has been well-known, and there is no change in our stance," Cho said when asked about the possibility of the bilateral summit.

Seoul and Tokyo held a fourth round of talks on the issue of Japan's sex slaves on Sept. 19, where South Korea urged Japan to come up with substantive measures as it believes discussions alone are not sufficient to resolve the issue.

The strategic dialogue among the vice foreign ministers from Seoul and Tokyo was launched in October 2005 with the aim of discussing long-term security and bilateral issues.

Next year marks the 50th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic relations between South Korea and Japan. South Korea was under Japan's colonial rule from 1910-45. (Yonhap)