SEOUL
\nJapanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida arrived in South Korea on Sunday as Seoul and Tokyo seek to restart their \u201cshuttle diplomacy\u201d and mend ties in the face of growing nuclear threats from Pyongyang.
\nKishida is making the first official bilateral visit by a Japanese leader to South Korea in over a decade. He first headed to Seoul\u2019s National Cemetery \u2014 where war veterans, including from the fight against Japanese colonial rule, are buried \u2014 to lay flowers and pay his respects.
\nKishida will hold a key summit later in the day with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, who has made resetting ties with Japan a top priority for his administration. Yoon was in Tokyo in March for a fence-mending visit.
\nThe East Asian neighbors, both crucial security allies of the United States, have long been at odds over historic issues linked to Japan\u2019s brutal 1910 to 1945 colonial occupation of the Korean peninsula, including sexual slavery and forced labor.
\nKishida said Sunday ahead of his departure that the two leaders were working to resume so-called \u201cshuttle diplomacy\u201d \u2014 paused for years during a bitter trade spat linked to the forced labor issue.
\nDuring their March summit, Kishida and Yoon agreed to end tit-for-tat trade curbs, with Kishida inviting the South Korean leader to a G7 meeting in Hiroshima this month.
\nKishida said he was looking forward to \u201can honest exchange of views\u201d with Yoon, \u201cbased on a relationship of trust.\u201d
\nYoon is expected to host a dinner party at the presidential residence \u2014 likely serving Korean barbeque \u2014 and he may even cook for Kishida, according to local reports.
\nThe fact that Kishida headed straight for Seoul\u2019s National Cemetery to pay his respects is noteworthy, Lim Eun-jung, an associate professor at Kongju National University, told YTN news.
\n\u201cIt is a rare scene for a sitting Japanese prime minister to visit, so it makes me watch very closely.\u201d
\nYoon and Kishida are set to hold what Tokyo\u2019s leader said would be \u201ccandid discussions\u201d about the tricky topic of forced labor, which torpedoed ties in 2018.
\nThat year, South Korea\u2019s Supreme Court ordered Japanese firms to compensate the wartime victims of forced labor, enraging Tokyo and triggering an escalating series of economic measures.
\nBut Yoon, who took office last year, has sought to bury the historical hatchet, earlier announcing a plan to compensate victims without direct involvement from Tokyo \u2014 a move that was unpopular domestically.
\nDozens of South Koreans gathered Saturday to protest Kishida\u2019s trip, saying that Japan\u2019s wartime animosities must top the agenda at Sunday\u2019s summit.
\nKishida \u201cmust sincerely apologize for Japan\u2019s crimes against humanity and fulfil its responsibilities,\u201d said demonstrator Kim Jae-won.
\nThe best possible outcome for Koreans would be for \u201cKishida to apologize in his own words,\u201d Benjamin A. Engel, research professor at the Institute of International Affairs at Seoul National University, told AFP.
\nEfforts to mend ties come as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who last year declared his country an \u201cirreversible\u201d nuclear power, doubles down on weapons development and testing.
\nPyongyang has conducted a record-breaking string of launches in 2023, including test-firing the country\u2019s first solid-fuel ballistic missile \u2014 a technical breakthrough.
\nThe United States and South Korea have in turn been ramping up their defense cooperation, staging a series of major military exercises including two trilateral drills involving Japan this year.
\n\u201cBy reinstating \u2018shuttle diplomacy,\u2019 President Yoon will achieve a significant diplomatic victory before his first year in office concludes,\u201d Tongfi Kim of the Brussels School of Governance wrote.
\n\u201cBarring diplomatic \u2018accidents\u2019 due to careless mistakes, Kishida\u2019s visit to South Korea will have a positive impact on the bilateral relationship and pave the way for deepening US-Japan-South Korea trilateral cooperation in the coming months.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SEOUL Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida arrived in South Korea on Sunday as Seoul and Tokyo seek to restart their \u201cshuttle diplomacy\u201d and mend ties in the face of growing nuclear threats from Pyongyang. Kishida is making the first official bilateral visit by a Japanese leader to South Korea in over a decade. He first […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":329972,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-329953","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n