Japan under the leadership of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe appears to have abandoned its desire to cultivate friendship with its neighbors, notably Korea and China. To the chagrin of the victims of Japan’s imperialist expansion, Abe came near to denying Japan’s invasion of neighboring Asian countries when he said on Tuesday that there was “no clear definition of an invasion internationally and academically.”
Abe went on to say that what happened in international relations might look different, depending on the angle from which it was to be seen. What he apparently meant to say when he made these remarks was that Japan might not regard its colonial occupation of Korea and other Asian countries as an invasion. He was deliberately ignoring the pain and damage Japan inflicted on Koreans and other people, including women forced into sexual slavery.
On Wednesday, the prime minister came to the defense of his Cabinet members that had visited the Yasukuni Shrine the previous day to pay homage to the enshrined war dead, including Class A war criminals.
“It was natural (for them) to express their respect and thoughts to worship the spirits of those who devoted their precious lives to the nation,” he said, adding that they had the “freedom not to yield to any kind of threats.”
Their Yasukuni visit angered Korea and China. But the Japanese chief Cabinet secretary, Yoshihide Suga, said that Japan did not want to see its relations with Korea and China worsened by the visit. He added in his regular news briefing on Wednesday that it was not desirable to allow a problem concerning the perception of history develop into a diplomatic and political issue.
Contrary to the chief Cabinet secretary’s wishes, however, Abe’s nationalist remarks and the Yasukuni visit by his Cabinet members further strained Korean-Japanese relations that were already tense. When the chief Cabinet secretary was making a news briefing in Tokyo, Korean Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kyou-hyun was lodging a strong protest via Koro Bessho, Japanese ambassador to Seoul, who had been summoned to the Foreign Ministry.
Korea is considering recalling its ambassador to Tokyo as a means of protest next time, should the conflict worsen. But that will not be enough. In addition to the one-off action, President Park Geun-hye’s administration may well shelve its desire to develop friendly relations with an irritating Abe government, even if the loss of friendship is more damaging to Korea than to Japan. Friendship is reciprocal, period.
