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Post by Admin on Nov 2, 2018 18:12:42 GMT
In a potentially far-reaching decision, South Korea’s Supreme Court has ruled that a Japanese steelmaker should compensate four South Koreans for forced labor during Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula before the end of World War II. The long-awaited ruling, delivered after more than five years of deliberation at Seoul’s top court, could have larger implications for similar lawsuits that are pending in South Korea and will likely trigger a diplomatic row between the Asian U.S. allies. Seoul and Tokyo’s bitter disputes over history, also including issues surrounding South Korean women forced into wartime sexual slavery, have complicated Washington’s efforts to strengthen trilateral cooperation to deal with North Korea’s nuclear threat and China’s growing influence in the region. South Korea’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Noh Kyu-duk said Tokyo and Seoul “should gather wisdom” to prevent the ruling from negatively affecting their relations. Japanese media earlier quoted Japanese officials as saying that Tokyo would consider taking the forced labor case to the International Court of Justice if the countries fail to resolve the issue diplomatically. The court said Japan’s Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corporation should compensate 100 million won ($87,680) each to four plaintiffs. Among them, only 94-year-old Lee Chun-sik has survived the legal battle that extended for nearly 14 years. Tokyo maintains that the $500 million Japan provided to South Korea under the 1965 treaty was meant to permanently settle all wartime compensation issues. But the Supreme Court in Tuesday’s ruling said the treaty does not terminate individuals’ rights to seek compensation for the “inhumane illegal” experiences they were forced into.
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Post by Admin on Nov 3, 2018 18:04:25 GMT
South Korea’s top court ruled on Tuesday that Japan’s Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp. [5401.T] must compensate four South Koreans for their wartime forced labor, a binding verdict Japan denounced as “unthinkable” while expressing hope it would not hurt the uneasy neighbors’ cooperation on North Korea. South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha and her Japanese counterpart, Taro Kono, stressed in a Wednesday telephone call the need to keep cooperating “for the future oriented development of the relationship”, South Korea’s foreign ministry said. The two countries need to cooperate to rein in North Korea’s nuclear and missile program, and they also have close business ties. Japanese firms invested $1.84 billion in South Korea last year, its second largest foreign investor, Korean data show. But relations have long been plagued by the legacy of Japan’s 1910-45 colonizations of the peninsula and the war, including the matter of “comfort women”, a euphemism for girls and women forced to work in Japanese wartime military brothels. “The sentiments of compromise are in short supply in both countries,” said Jeffrey Kingston, director of Asia studies at Temple University’s Japan campus. “Basically, across the political spectrum, Koreans feel Japan has inadequately addressed the wounds of the past,” he said. “Japan feels it has already resolved the issue legally and they don’t want to show flexibility because it would open up a Pandora’s box of claims” against other Japanese firms. There are 14 similar lawsuits pending against firms including Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd [7011.T] and Mitsui Mining and Smelting Co Ltd [5706.T]. Two are class action suits with a total 752 plaintiffs.
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Post by Admin on Nov 5, 2018 18:01:28 GMT
Japan’s top diplomat says it’s up to South Korea to resolve forced labor claims looming over dozens of Japanese companies that are threatening to upend ties between the two neighbors. Foreign Minister Taro Kono said in an interview Sunday that the South Korean Supreme Court’s decision last week ordering a Japanese company to pay compensation to people forced into its service during Japan’s 1910-45 occupation of the country posed a “serious challenge” to relations. Japan holds that such claims were settled under a 1965 treaty, which came with a $300 million payment. “It’s obvious: they are responsible for taking care of all the claims from the Korean people. So that’s what they have to do,” Kono told Bloomberg News in Tokyo. “That’s what’s in the 1965 agreement.” The court said Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp. must pay 100 million won ($88,000) compensation to each of four plaintiffs who had sued over being forced to work for a forerunner of the company prior to 1945. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told parliament last week that not all the Korean workers who came to Japan in the colonial era were conscripted, and that the four were brought over under a “recruitment” order.
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Post by Admin on Nov 30, 2018 21:25:04 GMT
The Japan Times, which marked its 120th anniversary last year, said in an editor’s note in Friday’s edition that it would ditch the commonly used term “forced labour” to describe Koreans who were made to work in Japanese mines and factories during its 1910-45 colonial rule over the Korean peninsula. South Korea says there were nearly 150,000 victims of wartime forced labour, 5,000 of whom are alive. The Japan Times said: “The term ‘forced labour’ has been used to refer to labourers who were recruited before and during world war two to work for Japanese companies. However, because the conditions they worked under or how these workers were recruited varied, we will henceforth refer to them as ‘wartime labourers.’” The explanation appeared at the foot of an article about the South Korean supreme court’s decision this week to order Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to compensate 10 former forced labourers. The ruling, and a similar decision last month, have soured ties between Tokyo and Seoul, with Japan’s foreign minister, Tarō Kōno, calling them “totally unacceptable”.
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Post by Admin on Jan 3, 2019 18:18:18 GMT
Lawyers for South Koreans forced into wartime labor have taken legal steps to seize the South Korean assets of a Japanese company they are trying to pressure into obeying a court ruling to provide them compensation. Lawyer Lim Jae-sung said Thursday the court in the city of Pohang could decide in two or three weeks whether to accept the request to seize the 2.34 million shares Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp. holds in its joint venture with South Korean steelmaker POSCO, which are estimated to be worth around $9.7 million. Lim said Nippon Steel has been refusing to discuss compensation despite a ruling by South Korea’s Supreme Court in October that the company should pay 100 million won ($88,000) each to four plaintiffs who worked at its steel mills during Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula. The court made a similar ruling on Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in November, triggering a diplomatic spats between the countries.
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