Politic-Economic-Society-Tech

Seoul seeks int'l pressure on Japan over textbooks 

South Korea plans to propose an international conference on racism to discuss Japan's distortion of history in its textbooks, officials said yesterday. 
The Seoul government has also decided to delay its market opening to Japanese cultural products and freeze exchange programs with Tokyo at various levels, they said. 

The decisions were made yesterday at a joint meeting of an inter-government taskforce and an advisory group of experts. 

The meeting was convened to discuss countermeasures against Japan's recent refusal to revise its school textbooks that are accused of glossing over its imperialism-era atrocities. 

Also yesterday, President Kim Dae-jung once again urged Japan to come up with sincere measures to resolve the dispute in a meeting with top-level officials of the ruling Millennium Democratic Party. 

"Japan still does not repent its past wrongdoings and does not teach students the truth about Japanese history. This is not a problem of the past, but of the present," Kim was quoted by MDP spokesman Jeon Yong-hak as saying. 

"The Korean government will make persistent efforts to ensure Japan revise the books, while trying to gain support from the international community," the President said. 

Seoul officials said Korea will seek support from the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, which will be held in Durban, South Africa, Aug. 31-Sept. 7. 

Korea plans to suggest that the conference resolution and action plan include a passage calling for "the need for proper education on past history." 

The government will also support the bid of developing countries to pressure Japan and other past colonial rulers into taking responsibility for their actions and paying compensation. 

The anti-racism conference will be hosted by the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights. A minister-level official will lead the Korean delegation. 

"The Korean delegation will publicize Japan's brutal colonial rule of Korea from 1910 to 1945 and its attempts to whitewash its atrocities in the textbooks," a Foreign Ministry official said. 

At the meeting, Seoul will form a joint front with North Korea and China, which have strongly denounced Japan's refusal to amend the textbooks. 

Seoul will also take the textbook issue to the U.N. General Assembly in September and a U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization conference in October, he said. 

Seoul officials have also decided to freeze additional market openings to Japanese cultural products. 

Seoul began lifting a ban on Japanese cultural products in October 1998. The government planned to allow imports of more items this fall, including pop music albums, television programs, adult movies, game programs and large-screen animated films. 

The taskforce meeting also discussed other various measures, which will be announced later after further discussion by concerned government agencies. 


By Hwang Jang-jin Staff reporter 


source: Korea Herald, July 13, 2001