Japan will make a "strong protest" to North Korea after the communist state fabricated all its evidence about the fate of Japanese whom it kidnapped during the Cold War, victims' relatives said yesterday.
Government officials met family members of the Japanese kidnapped by North Korean agents amid growing public anger and calls for economic sanctions against Kim Jong-il's regime.
The officials said a government examination, initial findings of which were announced earlier this month, concluded that human remains which North Korea gave a visiting Japanese mission last month did not match the abduction victims.
"All the evidence was complete fabrication," one of the government officials said at the closed meeting, according to a relative.
"We cannot accept that," the official was quoted as saying. "The re-examination ordered by Secretary-General Kim lacked sincerity. We will make a strong protest."
The official said that Japan would deliver the results of its final study of the remains to the North Korean embassy in Beijing.
The evidence offered by North Korea included ashes said to be those of Megumi Yokota, who was 13 when she was whisked away in 1977 by North Korean agents who kidnapped Japanese people to train spies.
Japanese forensic experts have already said DNA tests proved the ashes are not those of Yokota, whose case has attracted great public sympathy.
North Korea has insisted the remains are genuine. Its official media said Thursday that Yokota's North Korean husband is requesting the return of the ashes in their original state.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda, the Japanese government spokesman, on yesterday rejected any thought of returning the remains.
"We are not thinking about [that]," he told reporters.
The controversy has led lawmakers to demand economic sanctions against cash-strapped but heavily armed North Korea.
But Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has said such measures would be a last resort against the unpredictable neighbor, which fired a missile over Japan in 1998.
In 2002, Kim for the first time admitted that North Korea had kidnapped Japanese people and allowed five of them to come home, a move which led to aid from Japan and cleared the way for talks on normalizing relations.
But Japan believes at least 10 more abduction victims are alive and being kept under wraps, possibly because they know secrets about the isolated Stalinist state.
North Korea says eight of them are dead and the two others never entered its territory.
The kidnapping issue has dogged relations between North Korea and Japan as they take part in six-nation talks on curbing Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions.
The US, South Korea and China have all expressed caution about imposing sanctions against North Korea, fearing such a move would deal a blow to the nuclear talks.
A newspaper poll said Tuesday nearly two-thirds of Japanese want sanctions against North Korea over the kidnapping dispute but that the public understands why Koizumi is being cautious with Pyongyang.
‘GREAT OPPRTUNITY’: The Paraguayan president made the remarks following Donald Trump’s tapping of several figures with deep Latin America expertise for his Cabinet Paraguay President Santiago Pena called US president-elect Donald Trump’s incoming foreign policy team a “dream come true” as his nation stands to become more relevant in the next US administration. “It’s a great opportunity for us to advance very, very fast in the bilateral agenda on trade, security, rule of law and make Paraguay a much closer ally” to the US, Pena said in an interview in Washington ahead of Trump’s inauguration today. “One of the biggest challenges for Paraguay was that image of an island surrounded by land, a country that was isolated and not many people know about it,”
DIALOGUE: US president-elect Donald Trump on his Truth Social platform confirmed that he had spoken with Xi, saying ‘the call was a very good one’ for the US and China US president-elect Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) discussed Taiwan, trade, fentanyl and TikTok in a phone call on Friday, just days before Trump heads back to the White House with vows to impose tariffs and other measures on the US’ biggest rival. Despite that, Xi congratulated Trump on his second term and pushed for improved ties, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. The call came the same day that the US Supreme Court backed a law banning TikTok unless it is sold by its China-based parent company. “We both attach great importance to interaction, hope for
‘FIGHT TO THE END’: Attacking a court is ‘unprecedented’ in South Korea and those involved would likely face jail time, a South Korean political pundit said Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol yesterday stormed a Seoul court after a judge extended the impeached leader’s detention over his ill-fated attempt to impose martial law. Tens of thousands of people had gathered outside the Seoul Western District Court on Saturday in a show of support for Yoon, who became South Korea’s first sitting head of state to be arrested in a dawn raid last week. After the court extended his detention on Saturday, the president’s supporters smashed windows and doors as they rushed inside the building. Hundreds of police officers charged into the court, arresting dozens and denouncing an
‘DISCRIMINATION’: The US Office of Personnel Management ordered that public DEI-focused Web pages be taken down, while training and contracts were canceled US President Donald Trump’s administration on Tuesday moved to end affirmative action in federal contracting and directed that all federal diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) staff be put on paid leave and eventually be laid off. The moves follow an executive order Trump signed on his first day ordering a sweeping dismantling of the federal government’s diversity and inclusion programs. Trump has called the programs “discrimination” and called to restore “merit-based” hiring. The executive order on affirmative action revokes an order issued by former US president Lyndon Johnson, and curtails DEI programs by federal contractors and grant recipients. It is using one of the
RSS