JAPAN: Koizumi’s Diplomatic Gains in Pyongyang a Failure at Home

By Suvendrini Kakuchi Reprint | | Print |

Suvendrini Kakuchi

TOKYO, Sep 17 2002 (IPS) - Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s summit Tuesday with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il may have been an ice-breaking political feat, but it brought only heartbreak to those Japanese who got confirmation that their kin had indeed been abducted by Pyongyang.

Because of the uproar here at home after North Korea’s admission for the first time that its agents had kidnapped Japanese nationals in the seventies and eighties – a long festering row between Tokyo and Pyongyang – Koizumi took pains to speak cautiously about the historic meeting between the two countries’ leaders.

While improving ties with North Korea was important, Koizumi said he was “shocked” by Kim’s admission about the abductions. “My heart aches when I consider how the families must feel,” Koizumi said.

Koizumi flew into the North Korean capital at 9.15 a.m. for a summit with the reclusive Kim, marking the first meeting between the two and the first time that a Japanese head of state has visited the Stalinist state.

At the end of the day, Koizumi brought home astonishing news: North Korea had agreed to an indefinite suspension of its missile programme and accepted nuclear inspections. Japan apologised for its occupation of the Korean peninsula in 1910 to 1945, while North Korea dropped its demand for war reparations.

But what has resonated here is Kim’s confirmation of the abductions of Japanese nationals – Tokyo says there were 11 of them — who were forced to teach Pyongyang’s spies how to speak the Japanese language and act like them in order pass off as Japanese when they infiltrated the country.

Kim also said that six of the abducted Japanese were already dead.

“We will not forgive the North Koreans for this terrible crime,” sobbed Shigeru Yokota, who on Tuesday got confirmation that his daughter Megumi, abducted on her way home from school in 1977 when she was 13, was indeed dead.

“I want North Korea to fully investigate how Megumi went to North Korea, how she got married, and how she died,” sobbed Yokota.

At least four of kidnapped Japanese are alive and arrangements might be made to bring them back to Japan, according to Kim. Koizumi quoted Kim as saying the abductions had been carried out by “elements in the military”.

Pyongyang says that the abducted Japanese perished either due to “illness or natural disasters”. It only acknowledges that 10 of the reported missing persons had entered North Korea.

Akihito Arimoto, whose daughter, Keiko, 23, was kidnapped in 1983 while studying in London, said: “We are also angry at the Japanese government and also hold them responsible for the deaths of our loved ones.”

Analysts contend that the families’ anger and sweeping public sympathy for them have marred Koizumi’s historic trip to North Korea, despite its larger ramifications for Asian and international security.

Despite Tuesday’s summit, ties between Japan and North Korea, frosty and suspicious for decades, are unlikely to warm overnight.

“There is no doubt the Japanese government will be hampered in its attempts to normalise relations with North Korea because of the terrible news of the abductions,” said Professor Masao Okonogi, an expert on the Korean peninsula at Keio University.

Koizumi’s arrival in Pyongyang was kept low-key, and Kim was not present to greet him upon. When the two finally appeared publicly before the cameras, they looked tense.

In the joint communique issued by the two leaders, they spelled out a deal that, if carried out smoothly, promises to usher in a new era for the two countries with the promise of regional stability.

The broad accord not only covered the abductions, but two other contentious issues — the freezing of North Korea’s missile programme and its acceptance of nuclear inspections.

Koizumi, despite his sombre expression following the news of the abductions, stated clearly during a press conference that he believes his visit opens a new chapter in regional security.

“The summit was a success for the fact that North Korea for the first time disclosed information and accepted and apologised for the abductions,” he said.

The deal on both the missile and nuclear inspection issues “signals the beginning of a thawing of relations between the two countries”, said Koizumi, who is likely to win diplomatic points for influencing North Korea, which has been emerging from isolation in the last two years.

On North Korea’s demand for compensation for Japan’s colonisation, Tokyo on Tuesday agreed to provide it with grants, low-interest loans and humanitarian aid through international organisations on condition that the two countries normalise diplomatic ties.

Japan and North Korea have no diplomatic ties, their relations stalled by their bitter historical past. Further talks are scheduled in October.

The joint statement also said that in normalising ties, the parties would abandon each other’s claims on national and individual assets prior to the end of World War II.

Still, analysts contend that Koizumi has to proceed cautiously in the diplomatic advances he made Tuesday, given the sensitive, emotional issue of the abductions here in Japan.

A group of Diet or Parliament members supporting the relatives released a statement condemning the abductions as “state terrorism” and demanded that the Japanese government take severe punitive steps against Pyongyang, including the suspension of food aid to North Korea.

“Normalising ties (with North Korea) is out of the question,” said one of the lawmakers.

The United States and South Korea — which, together with Japan comprise the trilateral diplomatic effort toward Pyongyang — welcomed the visit.

South Korean media quoted President Kim Dae Jung as saying that the summit was a success, as economic aid to Pyongyang would ease Seoul’s burden of coping with refugees from the North.

The United States, which has put North Korea, along with Iraq and Iran, in the “axis of evil”, welcomed Kim Jong-Il’s pledge to freeze the nation’s missile programme.

But Professor Teruo Komaki of Kokugakuin University says the effect of the summit on Japan-Korea ties will be tested by opposition at home. Warned Komaki: “There is going to be anger against Koizumi and the Foreign Ministry, which has already been accused of using the abduction issue for political advancement.”