Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

South Korea Postpones Intelligence Pact With Japan

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • South Korea Postpones Intelligence Pact With Japan

    The New York Times

    June 29, 2012
    South Korea Postpones Military Pact With Japan
    By CHOE SANG-HUN

    SEOUL, South Korea — Faced with mounting political pressure at home, the South Korean government on Friday abruptly postponed the signing of its first military cooperation pact with Japan since World War II.

    Now the fate of the agreement has become uncertain as South Korea’s political parties look ahead to a presidential election later this year.

    The government and opposition parties agreed Friday to convene the National Assembly on Monday, and the Foreign Ministry said the session would give it a chance to explain and seek parliamentary support for the pact.

    The opposition and other government critics bitterly accused the government of trying to rush the agreement through without adequate public debate.

    “We have decided to push for the signing after consultations with the National Assembly,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. The deal had been hailed as a significant step by the two governments. Both countries have been struggling to overcome the historical bitterness between their peoples and to cooperate more closely on mutual security matters in the region. The pact provides a legal framework for South Korea and Japan to share and protect classified military data so they can deal more effectively with the threats posed by North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs and China’s growing military influence.

    Washington has urged the governments in Tokyo and Seoul to increase cooperation.

    But the pact set off an uproar in South Korea, where resentment of Japan’s early 20th-century colonization remains raw and the public regards any sign of Japan’s growing military role with deep suspicion. The opposition accused President Lee Myung-bak of succumbing to American pressure and called him “pro-Japanese,” the worst accusation a South Korean politician could face, especially in an election year. Friday’s postponement provided Washington with yet another reminder of how delicate and unpredictable the relations between its two main Asian allies can be and how difficult it is to persuade them to cooperate within what the United States envisions as a trilateral alliance.

    Earlier on Friday, despite the outcry, the South Korean Foreign Ministry issued a news release reconfirming that the deal would be signed later in the day, after the Japanese cabinet approved it.

    The Japanese cabinet did, and Japan’s foreign minister called the agreement a “historic event.”

    But Seoul requested a postponement at the last minute.

    Hours before, Lee Hahn-koo — the floor leader of the governing New Frontier Party and an ally of Park Geun-hye, the party’s leading contender for the presidential nomination — called the foreign minister, Kim Sung-hwan, to demand a postponement. Jin Young, the chief policy maker of the party, said the deal “contradicted the people’s sentiments.”

    Ms. Park, the front-runner in the December election, is the daughter of the military strongman Park Chung-hee, who ruled South Korea from 1961 until his assassination in 1979. Her father once served as an officer in the Japanese Imperial Army, and the opposition’s accusation that Ms. Park’s father was a “pro-Japanese collaborator” is a hurdle that she must overcome.

    More in Asia Pacific (4 of 55 articles)
    India Ink: Image of the Day: June 29

    Read More »
    “the misery of being exploited by capitalists is nothing compared to the misery of not being exploited at all” -- Joan Robinson
Working...
X