(CNN) Leaders of South Korea and Japan have vowed to resume ties at a fence-mending summit — the first meeting of its kind in 12 years — as the two neighbors seek to confront threats from North Korea and the US to address growing concerns about China.
“From now on, I would like to open a new chapter in Japan-South Korea relations through frequent visits to both sides without any formality,” said Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida after meeting South Korean President Yoon Suk in Tokyo Yeol.
Mutual visits by Japanese and South Korean leaders have been suspended for 12 years as relations soured over several issues, including a wartime industrial dispute.
The shared security challenges facing both nations were made clear just hours before the trip, when North Korea launched a long-range ballistic missile into the waters off the east coast of the Korean Peninsula — the fourth launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile in less than a year.
During Thursday’s joint statement, Kishida said that Japan and South Korea had agreed to resume bilateral security talks in the face of North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats, and reaffirmed the importance of the “free and open Indo-Pacific” and protecting the international rules-based order.
And Yoon said he had agreed to “fully normalize” his military intelligence-sharing deal with Japan.
“I believe the two countries should be able to exchange information and respond to North Korea’s nuclear missile launches and trajectories,” he said.
In 2019, South Korea terminated its military intelligence-sharing agreement with Japan amid a long-running dispute over forced labor by Japan during its occupation of Korea, which pushed ties to their lowest point in decades.
The Yoon-Kishida summit is a crucial step in repairing fractured ties after decades of feuding and distrust between the two crucial US allies in Asia.
Yoon’s office has described it as “an important milestone” in the development of the bilateral relationship.
The two leaders are expected to share a dinner of sukiyaki and “omurice,” or omelet rice in English, based on Yoon’s request that he like those dishes, Japan’s public broadcaster NHK reported.
The two East Asian neighbors have a long history of bitterness, dating back to Japan’s colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula a century ago.
The two relations normalized in 1965, but unresolved historical disputes continued to simmer, particularly over colonial Japan Use of forced labor and so-called “comfort women” sex slaves.
The often strained relationship has undermined US efforts to establish a united front against North Korea in recent years — and Beijing’s growing assertiveness.
Now the region’s two key allies to the US appear poised to turn a page.
In another sign of goodwill, ahead of Thursday’s summit, Japan and South Korea agreed to settle a trade dispute that has strained ties for years.
Japan will lift export controls on high-tech materials used in semiconductors and display panels to South Korea, while Seoul will withdraw its complaint to the World Trade Organization about the restrictions.
South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol arrives with his wife Kim Keon-hee at Haneda International Airport in Tokyo March 16, 2023.
Common strategic interests
Much of the two neighbors’ rapprochement is fueled by rising security concerns over Pyongyang’s increasingly frequent missile tests, China’s increasingly aggressive military stance and tensions in the Taiwan Strait — an area both Tokyo and Seoul say is vital to their respective security is.
Commenting on the summit, China’s Foreign Ministry said Beijing rejects the so-called “closed and exclusive circle of individual countries,” adding that it hopes “Japan-South Korea relations will develop toward peace, stability and prosperity in the region.” “.
The warming ties are welcome news for Washington, which has pushed the détente.
“Our cooperation not only on the political front, but also on the strategic front, on the deterrence front, is what North Korea is afraid of. That’s also what China doesn’t want to see,” Rahm Emanuel, U.S. ambassador to Japan, told CNN on Thursday.
Emanuel said the US, Japan and South Korea held over 40 trilateral meetings at different levels last year – more than in the previous five years combined.
“That familiarity, that institutionalized dialogue and dialogue, the building of trust, was probably the biggest contributor” to thawing bonds, he said.
Under Yoon’s predecessor, Moon Jae-in, South Korea’s relationship with Japan was “openly combative,” said Joel Atkinson, a professor of Northeast Asian international politics at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in Seoul.
“So this visit is significant and sends a strong signal that both sides are now working much more cooperatively under the Yoon administration,” Atkinson said.
overcome dispute
The thaw in ties comes after South Korea took a major step towards resolving a long-standing dispute that has pushed ties to their lowest point in decades.
Last week, South Korea announced it would compensate victims of forced labor under Japanese occupation from 1910 to 1945 through a public foundation funded by private Korean companies – rather than asking Japanese companies to contribute to the reparations.
The move was welcomed by Japan and welcomed by the White House.
Yoon has made efforts to mend relations — even if that means bucking domestic public pressure on contentious, highly emotional issues like the compensation plan.
Aside from the growing nuclear threat posed by North Korea, China appears to have been a major factor in Yoon’s willingness to face the domestic political backlash to the indemnity deal, said Seoul-based expert Atkinson.
“The government is making it clear to the South Korean public that this is not just about Japan, but about working with a broader coalition of liberal democracies,” he said.
“What South Koreans perceive as bullying, arrogant treatment of their country by Beijing, as well as the crackdown on Hong Kong protests, threats against Taiwan and so on, definitely set the stage for that.”
Warm ties
Even before the decisive step to settle the historic dispute, Seoul and Tokyo had signaled their willingness to put the past behind them and cultivate closer ties.
On March 1, in a speech commemorating the 104th anniversary of South Korea’s protest movement against Japanese colonial occupation, Yoon said Japan had “transformed from a militaristic aggressor of the past into a partner” that “shares the same universal values.”
Since taking office, the two leaders have launched a series of diplomatic activities aimed at improving bilateral ties — and deepening their mutual cooperation with Washington.
In September, Yoon and Kishida held the first summit between the two countries since 2019 in New York on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, where they agreed to improve ties.
Closer rapprochement between the US, Japan and South Korea is an alarming development for China, which has accused Washington of leading a campaign to contain and suppress its development.
But Emanuel argued it was Beijing’s own actions that brought the countries together.
“If China weren’t twice on the border with India, or the Philippines twice in a confrontation with the Coast Guard, or firing rockets in Japan’s (Exclusive Economic Zone), nobody would be like that,” he said.
“This is a recent development in response to China’s constant confrontation with others.”
CNN’s Emiko Jozuka and Yoonjung Seo contributed coverage