| |
Japan, North Korea stumble over
abductions
By Richard
Hanson
TOKYO - In the cockeyed world of diplomacy
with North Korea, the small Japanese Foreign Ministry
entourage that returned from a brief visit to Pyongyang
achieved quite a lot - or not very much. The issue of
Japanese nationals abducted by Pyongyang was dominant.
For one thing, after a year's hiatus in talks to
normalize relations between two countries, the two sides
actually met from Wednesday through Saturday. The
five-member Japanese delegation was headed by Deputy
Foreign Minister Hitoshi Tanaka and Mitoji Yabunaka,
head of the Foreign Ministry's Asian and Oceanic Affairs
Bureau,
This enabled both Japan and North Korea
to probe the bilateral ground for the second round of
"six-nation" talks later this month on defusing the
North Korean nuclear crisis. The six-party talks are
scheduled to open in Beijing on February 25 and last
several days. In addition to North Korea and South
Korea, the talks will involve China, Japan, Russia and
the United States.
"The two sides [re]stated
their positions on the abduction issue, so we could not
produce tangible results," a spokesman for the Japanese
Foreign Ministry said after Japanese diplomats returned
home Saturday.
The abduction of 13 Japanese
nationals by North Korea in the late 1970s and early
1980s is the major stumbling block to improving
diplomatic relations. When Japanese Prime Minister
Junichiro Koizumi made ahistoric trip to the North in
September 2002, North Korean leader Kim Jong-il admitted
that government agents abducted the Japanese nationals,
eight of whom reportedly died. Five survivors have been
allowed to return to Japan, but their relatives,
numbering eight, have remained in North Korea.
Tanaka and Yabunaka, heads of the delegation,
demanded an immediate, unconditional visit to Japan by
the eight relatives of five abducted people who returned
to Japan, according to the Japanese foreign ministry
official who briefed journalists on the visit. Japan
also wants to know what exactly happened to those listed
as dead.
Abductions overshadow North Korea
nukes
This remains a highly emotional subject in
Japan, where the revelations over the abductions have
overshadowed other issues on the table, such as North
Korea's nuclear and missile programs that threaten
Japan's security.
Ironically, North Korea's
lapse into apparent candor over part of the mystery
behind the abductions has wetted the Japan's desire to
know more.
"If they were sent off to political
prison camps and suffered there the way political
prisoners usually have, coming clean on that could be as
damaging to Kim Jong-il as his earlier confession that
the North had abducted Japanese and some of them were
dead," said Bradley K Martin, author of a forthcoming
book on North Korea's Kim dynasty.
According to
Japanese press reports, Tokyo asked Pyongyang to set up
a joint agency to investigate the cases of some 10 other
Japanese nationals, most of whom North Korea has
admitted abducting and said were dead. There are strong
suspicions that many more people abducted from both
South Korea and Japan remain hidden, or perhaps
literally buried, in the North.
Despite the lack
of official progress, some believe that the talks did
indicate small, positive changes in North Korea's
attitude after a year of stalemate.
One
high-ranking Japanese politician, Shinzo Abe, secretary
general of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and a
hawk on the abduction issue, discerned a change in the
North Korean attitude as evidenced by the changed
behavior of a senior Pyongyang official. This assumes
personalities do indeed count.
Abe, responding
to reports of the talks, said that Kang Kok-ju, first
vice foreign minister and a diplomatic aide to Kim
Jong-il, "listened to Japan's arguments in silence",
without the usual objections.
Slight
improvement in Pyongyang's attitude
"This no
doubt represents one change. It bore major
significance," Abe, who is considered future prime
ministerial material, told one audience. Since Kang
reports directly to Kim Jong-il, his participation in
the talks means that Japan's stand will be conveyed to
the one person in North Korea who can make things
happen, other reports said.
North Korea's
acknowledgment of the kidnapping and that some died or
disappeared does not even begin to satisfy other arms of
the Japanese government. Kidnapping is not only a crime
against humanity; it is against the law. From testimony
of North Korean defectors and other evidence, it is
believed that a much larger group of Japanese have been
taken by North Korean agents over the past couple
decades.
The reasons for the abduction have not
been spelled out, but it is believed they may have been
abducted in order to help North Korea agents better
understand Japanese behavior, customs and language.
In Japan, police investigations already are
under way in an effort to determine whether foul play
was involved in a number of Japanese nationals abducted
by North Korea and listed as missing. This is where all
of North Korea's neighbors share an urgent common
interest in what North Korea will do. China, which
maintains an economic pipeline for the desperately poor
country, is especially concerned, and in recent months
it has bolstered its military presence on its porous
border with North Korea.
Other forms of aid to
North Korea have in large measure dried up since United
States President George W Bush labeled Pyongyang one of
his "axis of evil", including Iran and Iraq. Numerous
reports indicate serious ongoing shortages of food in
the North, where starvation in recent years is reported
to have taken a huge toll.
China is will set the
tone of the six-nation talks. North Korea is reported as
saying that will not let Japan participate in the talks
if the abduction issue is brought up. A North Korean
Foreign Ministry spokesman this weekend said that North
would refuse Japanese participation in the six-way talks
in Beijing, if Japan proposes the abduction issue be put
on the agenda of the multilateral talks on the North's
nuclear weapons program.
Meanwhile, Chinese Vice
Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who is expected to chair the
talks, told a senior ruling Liberal Democratic Party
(LDP) politician, that North Korea seems prepared to
settle the abduction issue in a "positive" way. "I am
hoping that some progress will be made by the visit to
North Korea," Wang was quoted as saying.
Abduction issue blocks
normalization
Officially, for Japan, the
abduction issue is at the heart of the problem of how
and when to revive talks over the normalization of
Japan-Korea diplomatic relations. If anything, the issue
has increased in intensity.
By sending Yabunaka
and Tanaka to Pyongyang, Japan sent to of its best-known
diplomats.Tanaka is known for helping to bring about the
breakthrough that enabled Koizumi to make his historic
visit to North Korea in September 2002. Tanaka, however,
has been criticized for not anticipating the public
furor in Japan over the abductions. It was during
Koizumi's visit that Kim Jong-il finally admitted to the
abductions, believing that the admission would clear the
air and open the way for better relations with Japan.
Koizumi was unprepared for the tidal wave of
backlash as the five returning abductees began telling
their stories to the Japanese people. The reason is
partly that Kim finally told what seemed to be the truth
about what the world knew or suspected was true of North
Korea's brutality.
Japanese officials also urged
North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons development
program, including the enrichment of uranium. North
Korea, however, denied existence of any program to
develop enriched uranium. Pyongyang also said that it is
waiting to see how the US and other countries will
respond to its offer to freeze its nuclear plan during
the six-nation talks.
Yabunaka from the foreign
ministry is expected to attend the next bilateral talks
in Beijing. Prior to that, he will meet with his
counterparts from the US and South Korea in Seoul on
February 23, where he will brief them on his latest
visit to Pyongyang and ask them to take up the abduction
issue during the six-nation talks.
Some say North
Korea may be relatively flexible and forthcoming in the
next round of talks because it is desperate to normalize
relations with other countries, especially Japan. Kim is
also desperate for money from Japan - the kind of
reparations for Japan's World War II atrocities that
South Korea received when it normalized relations in
1985.
For Pyongyang, normal Japan ties = $10
billion
Some reckon that a non-threatening North
Korea might have expected about US$10 billion in
normalizing gifts and reparations - that may still be on
Kim Jong-il's mind.
Japan, on the other hand,
has its own hard core. Japan's largest daily newspaper,
the conservative Yomiuri Shimbun, on Sunday ran a
no-nonsense editorial on the results of last week's
talks.
"North Korea's use of the dispute over
the abductees' families as a bargaining chip in its
negotiations with Japan is unforgivable. The two nations
agreed to continue official negotiations before wrapping
up the latest talks, but Japan should take an even
stricter approach to North Korea in future
talks
. "North Korea's decision to hold the
latest talks and its agreement to continue
government-level negotiations with Japan may be part of
a very calculated move. Pyongyang has good reason to
fear antagonizing the Japanese even more by refusing to
sit down at the negotiating table over the abduction
issue," the Yomiuri editorial said. "Japan must have as
many cards as possible up its sleeve when dealing with
North Korea."
(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online
Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for
information on our sales and syndication policies.)
|
| |
|
|
 |
|
