S.Koreans reject Seoul compensation for wartime Japanese forced labor
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South Korean victims reject Seoul's "dirty" compensation for wartime Japanese forced labor through a national public fund.
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Protesters attach stickers on an image of South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol during a rally against the South Korean government's announcement of a plan over the issue of compensation for forced labor in Goyang, South Korea, Wednesday, March 8, 2023. (AP)
Three South Korean survivors of forced labor by Japanese companies during WWII opposed the government's proposal to compensate them through a national public fund rather than Japanese companies, according to the victims' legal representatives.
According to the report, two of the victims, Yang Geum-deok and Kim Seong-joo, who won the court case against Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in 2018, have already filed an official document outlining their position to the Foundation for Victims of Forced Mobilization.
The South Korean government is unable to compensate the victims against their will and thus absolve Japanese companies of responsibility, according to the document.
Lee Chun-sik, another victim of wartime forced labor, submitted a similar statement through his lawyer, expressing his plan to reject third-party reimbursement.
'Compensation, boosting relations'
Last week, South Korea unveiled plans on Monday to pay victims of Japan's forced labor during WWII, intending to break a "vicious cycle" in Asian relations and boost ties between the two countries.
Japan and the United States immediately rushed to welcome the announcement, but victims criticized it as it falls well short of their demand for a comprehensive apology from Tokyo and direct compensation from the Japanese corporations implicated.
Foreign Minister Park Jin stated that Seoul's goal is to collect money from key South Korean corporations that benefited from a 1965 reparations agreement with Tokyo and use it to recompense victims.
The hope is that Japan will "positively respond to our major decision today with Japanese companies' voluntary contributions and a comprehensive apology," he added. "I believe that the vicious circle should be broken for the sake of the people at the national interest level," Park added.
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Tokyo maintains that the 1965 treaty, which saw the two countries reestablish diplomatic ties with a reparations package totaling roughly $800 million in grants and low-interest loans, resolved all disputes dating to the colonial period.
But Tokyo's Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi hailed the new plan, telling reporters it would help to restore "healthy" ties following years of tensions.
It is worth noting that in 2018, a South Korean court ordered Japanese firms Nippon Steel, Fujikoshi Corporation, and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, which used forced Korean labor during World War II, to compensate victims of forced labor.
