“When there is a threat over Taiwan and its democracy, it is a dire challenge to all of us, especially to Japan,” said Abe, who resigned from the premiership over health reasons but remains a heavyweight among Japanese legislators. “An adventure in military affairs, if pursued by such a huge economy like China’s, could be suicidal, to say the least.”

Abe’s reference to the economic costs of a conflict did little to dull the edge of the threat, as he emphasized the need for both Taiwan and Japan to coordinate security cooperation with the United States — which does not maintain official relations with the government in Taipei. And yet, that diplomatic lacuna has prevented neither Japanese nor American officials of late from characterizing Taiwan as the linchpin of Indo-Pacific security in the face of a rising Chinese Communist power.

“It’s critical for the United States, Japan, and Taiwan, as three indispensable cornerstones, to continue to stand shoulder-to-shoulder in order to address common challenges in the Indo-Pacific,” Sen. Bill Hagerty, a Tennessee Republican and former ambassador to China, told the Prospect Foundation’s Taiwan-US-Japan Trilateral Indo-Pacific Security Dialogue .

Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s representative to the forum, deputy assistant secretary Scott Busby, struck a similarly affirming note after touting the importance of “democracy and human rights” to American diplomacy.

“These values are a critical source of our strength, and a key advantage of the United States and our closest partners on the global stage — including Taiwan,” Busby told the trilateral forum.

Chinese Communist officials, who have claimed sovereignty over Taiwan since taking power in 1949 but have never ruled the island, regard such rhetoric as a sign of disrespect for their territorial claims. U.S. officials historically have tread carefully when discussing this subject, yet a bipartisan consensus is emerging in Washington that augurs for more forthright acknowledgment that the mainland Chinese regime’s acquisition of Taiwan would represent a serious threat to American interests.

“It’s plain to see that the Chinese Communist Party aims not only to achieve dominance in the world’s most vibrant and rapidly growing region, but also to fundamentally revise the environment here, placing the People’s Republic of China at the center and serving Beijing’s authoritarian and hegemonic ambitions,” Hagerty said. “The defense of Taiwan and Japan lies at the center of pushing back against the Chinese Communist Party’s revisionist ambitions.”

Hagerty’s remarks followed a line of analysis offered earlier this month by Abe, who said that Chinese General Secretary Xi Jinping should bear in mind that “a Taiwan emergency is a Japanese emergency, and therefore an emergency for the Japan-U.S. alliance.” The Chinese Foreign Ministry rebuked Abe for “openly challeng[ing] China’s sovereignty and [giving] brazen support to Taiwan independence forces,” a tongue-lashing delivered directly to the Japanese ambassador in Beijing.

Abe, for his part, cited the mainland Chinese threats against Taiwan as a key motivation for the Japanese military upgrades that took place during his tenure as prime minister.

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“Lest we forget, weakness invites provocations,” Abe told the trilateral security forum. “The three of us must stop no effort in building our capabilities in all domains, from the undersea, sea surface, air space, to the cyber and outer space. To that end, let us consider new ways of sharing our knowledge and technologies even more effectively.”

Source: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/defense-national-security/japans-shinzo-abe-warns-china-invasion-of-taiwan-would-be-suicidal

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“An adventure in military affairs, if pursued by such a huge economy like China’s, could be suicidal to say the least,” Abe said in a video lecture at an international forum held in Taipei by think tanks from Japan, Taiwan and the United States, and others.

Stressing the need to strongly tell Beijing that it should not pursue territorial expansion, Abe added that China should refrain from provoking and cornering its neighbors.

Through these remarks, the former prime minister apparently warned against China’s stepped-up military activities near Taiwan, the Senkaku Islands in Okinawa Prefecture, southern Japan, and the South China Sea. The Senkakus are claimed by China, which calls them Diaoyu.

Abe also called for solidarity among the democratic camp consisting of Japan, Taiwan, the United States and others.

Source: https://jen.jiji.com/jc/eng?g=eco&k=2021121400560

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Tourists in October on the Yankito Plateau on Iturup Island, the largest one of the Kuril Islands, known in Japan as the Northern Territories (Yuri Smityuk/TASS via Getty Images)

The decades-old dispute between Russia and Japan over the status of the Kuril Islands is far from over. Tokyo, which refers to the islands as the Northern Territories, still insists on a peace treaty with Moscow that would result in Russia’s return of at least two out of four islands to Japan, while the Kremlin keeps militarizing the disputed territory.

The chain of islands ­– stretching between the Japanese island of Hokkaido at the southern end and the Russian Kamchatka Peninsula in the north – was conquered by the Soviet Union at the end of the Second World War. Ever since, Moscow has considered the Kuril Islands an integral part of Russia. Japan thinks otherwise.

The four islands are variously known in Russia and Japan as either Shikotan, Habomai Islets/Khabomai, Kunashiri/Kunashir and Etorofu/Iturup. In 1956, the Soviet Union and Japan signed a joint declaration providing for the end of the state of war, and for restoration of diplomatic relations between USSR and Japan. The document also included a transfer of Habomai and Shikotan to Japan. But a dispute has lingered with no formal peace treaty between the two nations. Russia is the successor state of the Soviet Union, and it leaders have said on several occasions that they were ready to have territorial talks with Japan on the basis of the joint declaration.

The most recent talks between Russia and Japan over the status of the islands were held in early 2019. Japan’s then prime minister Shinzo Abe and Russian President Vladimir Putin had agreed to accelerate negotiations based on the 1956 document, which stated that the Habomai islets and Shikotan would be handed back to Japan, and the question of Kunashiri and Etorofu was to be settled during negotiations for a peace treaty.

Indications that the Kremlin was willing to discuss the status of Habomai islets and Shikotan was seen by some Russian nationalists as a treason, particularly in Sakhalin Oblast, the region which comprises the island of Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands. Recent constitutional changes in Russia suggest this view has only hardened. Even though the two islands represent only 7% of the land in question, the new Russian constitution enacted in July this year includes a ban on “any alienation of Russian territories”. This would seem to preclude the return of even one square metre of Russian territory to Japan.

Japanese leaders, on the other hand, claim that the Russian Federation, as the legal successor to the Soviet Union, is obliged to scrupulously observe all of past obligations, including the unfulfilled subparagraph on the territorial issue. Japan’s Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga recently said Tokyo plans to finalize the talks on the dispute.

“We need to achieve closure in the talks on the Northern Territories, instead of postponing it for future generations,” Suga said, and pointed out that he will strive for “comprehensive development of relations with Russia, including the signing of a peace agreement”.

All this ambition seems likely to go unfulfilled. And such a conclusion doesn’t only spring from more than 60 years of diplomatic stalemate, but also the stubborn facts of control on the ground.

Russian troops periodically conduct military drills on the disputed islands and may indeed go further. The Kremlin reportedly plans to deploy T-72B3 battle tanks to the Kuril Islands, where they can be used to destroy enemy assault forces and small enemy ships. In October, Russia deployed S-300V4 air defense missile systems to the territory for the first time to conduct military exercises. Although no one really expects Japan would invade the islands, Moscow clearly wants to make a show it does not intend to hand them over, either. With thousands of US troops already stationed in Japan, it’s not beyond some Russian analysts to speculate that Washington could establish naval bases in the Kuril Islands once Moscow and Tokyo resolve their territorial dispute.

Plus there is the potential wealth. The islands are surrounded by rich fishing grounds and are thought to have offshore reserves of oil and gas – although the value of such hydrocarbon claims are speculative. In addition, rare rhenium deposits have been found near the Kudriavy volcano on Etorofu.

Finally, a potential return of the Kuril Islands to Japan would be interpreted as a clear sign of Russian weakness, which means that Moscow could also face strong pressure from the West to return Crimea to Ukraine. Such a process would not only mean Russian humiliation in the global arena, but could also result in a serious political crisis that could lead to a breakup of the Russian Federation.

The prospective blow to Russian prestige therefore makes the territory is too important for the Kremlin to hand it over to Japan.

Source: https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/why-russia-will-not-return-kuril-islands-japan

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A pedestrian wearing a protective face mask amid the the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak is reflected on a screen displaying stock prices outside a brokerage in Tokyo, Japan, on March 17, 2020. Issei Kato/Reuters

The coronavirus is throttling the global economy. In a matter of weeks, the highly contagious disease has pushed the world to the brink of a recession more severe than the 2008 financial crisis. The depth and duration of the downturn will depend on many factors, including the behavior of the virus itself, public health responses, and economic interventions.

Given the extraordinary nature of the pandemic-induced crisis, fiscal and monetary policymakers are working without a playbook. Many, however, are moving forward with stunning bailouts that could collectively top $10 trillion.

How bad will the recession be?

Readings in April suggested the global economy was sailing into a colossal storm. “We anticipate the worst economic fallout since the Great Depression,” said Kristalina Georgieva, managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Meanwhile, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said its indicators produced the strongest warning on record that most major economies had entered a “sharp slowdown.” The World Trade Organization, for its part, forecast that nearly all regions of the world would suffer double-digit declines in trade this year, with North American and Asian exporters hit hardest.

Many governments have effectively frozen social and economic activity in all or parts of their countries to contain the outbreak, shuttering nonessential businesses and ordering residents to stay at home for weeks or months. Billions of people worldwide remain under some type of lockdown. Major industries, especially airlines and other travel-related sectors, are on the brink of bankruptcy. The hope is that economies can power down without causing extreme disruptions, such as widespread business failures or joblessness, and then quickly get back up to speed after the pandemic abates.

Just how quickly governments should unshackle their economies is a matter of debate. Some governments in Asia and Europe that feel they’ve contained the virus have begun to slowly reopen their economies. Similarly, more than a dozen U.S. states are loosening restrictions, and President Trump did not renew federal social-distancing guidelines, which expired on April 30. But new outbreaks have already caused some countries to reimpose restraints.

For now, some economists hope for a strong global rebound in the third quarter, mirroring the recoveries in Asia after the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak of 2003. However, others warn that the pandemic could be far more economically destructive than any past outbreak, and caution that a recovery could take much longer.

In the meantime, many world powers are moving mountains to prop up their economies during the coronavirus downturn.

China

The world’s second-largest economy was stirring back to life in April after suffering a withering blow from the coronavirus, which originated in the city of Wuhan in Hubei Province in late 2019. Several weeks of government-imposed lockdowns on dozens of cities led to steep declines in factory output, retail sales, construction, and other economic activity. Overall, gross domestic product (GDP) dipped almost 7 percent in the first quarter, China’s first economic contraction in more than forty years.

China’s leadership seems less inclined to spearhead a global economic recovery this time than it did following the 2008 financial crisis, when it spent liberally on a stimulus package of more than a half trillion dollars. In the years since, China has roughly doubled its government debt—to about 60 percent of gross domestic product (GDP)—and many analysts think it cannot afford to spend so aggressively again.

So far, China’s central bank has taken relatively modest actions, reducing reserve requirements for banks, which will allow them to loan an additional $80 billion to struggling businesses, and indicating that it will cut interest rates in the months ahead. “The normal monetary policy should be kept as long as possible,” wrote central bank chief Yi Gang in late April. “The impact of the pandemic is temporary. China’s economy has strong resilience and great potential, while the fundamentals for high-quality development won’t change.”

Analysts say a major sign to watch will be Beijing’s announcement of its annual growth target, which was postponed from March to May because of the virus. An ambitious goal of around 6 percent could signal that a hefty stimulus package is coming, while a more modest number, closer to 3 percent, would likely mean a continuation of the status quo. There is also a possibility that China may forgo setting a target for this year. To hit its long-held goal of doubling GDP between 2010 and 2020, China would have to grow at least 5.6 percent this year, a pace few economists think is possible.

Germany

The German economy is expected to shrink for the first time since 2009, anywhere from 3 to 10 percent this year. The government itself forecasted a contraction of just over 6 percent, which would be the economy’s worst performance in decades. In March, nearly a half million German companies applied to have their employees join a short-term government work program intended to prevent mass layoffs.

To counter the economic fallout from the coronavirus, Berlin is taking bold actions, abandoning its steadfast commitment to balanced budgets, known as schwarze Null or “black zero.” It is allocating at least 350 billion euros—or about 10 percent of its GDP—to prop up the eurozone’s largest economy. Funds will be spent to bail out struggling businesses, including by making unlimited loans and potentially taking equity stakes.

“We’re doing whatever is necessary,” said Chancellor Angela Merkel, who also led the country through the 2008 crisis. “And we won’t be asking every day what it means for our deficit.” Officials note that Germany is poised to spend aggressively because the government has kept its finances in check in recent years, reducing its debt-to-GDP ratio from more than 80 percent in 2010 to below 60 percent today.

After moving swiftly to control the outbreak within its borders, Germany announced in mid-April that it would slowly reopen its economy. However, Merkel cautioned state leaders—Germany has a federal system—to lift restrictions with great care.

Japan

Economists predict that Japan’s export-driven economy will shrink by around 3 percent this year, which would be its worst performance since 2008. The deep impact from the pandemic comes on the heels of an economic slowdown from a sales tax hike last fall. The virus has also forced the government to postpone the Summer Olympics until next year.

Like some of its peers in the West, the Japanese government has responded with a massive relief package, worth nearly $1 trillion, to help the country through one of its most challenging periods in recent memory. The headline figure is equal to about 20 percent of Japan’s GDP, but analysts say the actual spending impact will be much smaller.

“It is no exaggeration to say that Japan’s economy, and the world economy, is facing the biggest crisis since [World War II] right now. We will protect employment and life at all costs,” said Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Bailout measures include cash payments to citizens and small and midsize businesses, interest-free loans, delayed tax payments, and travel and tourism coupons.

Japan’s central bank announced in late April that it was prepared to buy an unlimited amount of government debt and to double its purchases of corporate debt. However, some critics say the Bank of Japan has limited options after having kept interest rates next to zero for years.

United Kingdom

The pandemic is paralyzing the British economy just as its leaders are negotiating a post-Brexit relationship with the European Union. Prior to the outbreak, there were already concerns about a recession from a so-called hard Brexit. Economists say that the coronavirus pandemic could take a 5 to 10 percent slice out of the economy in 2020.

The government is prepared to make interventions that would be “unprecedented in the history of the British state” to support the economy, finance minister Rishi Sunak said in early March. Among its emergency measures, the Treasury has pledged to pay 80 percent of workers’ salaries for several months to keep companies from resorting to huge layoffs; offered to reimburse self-employed workers for lost wages; deferred tax payments; increased unemployment benefits; established a loan program for small and midsize companies; and provided rescue aid to charities.

The Bank of England has dropped its benchmark interest rate to 0.5 percent, a record low, and loosened capital requirements for banks. In an extraordinary move in early April, the central bank agreed to directly finance the government’s spending during the crisis, freeing it from having to issue debt in the bond market. All told, the rescue efforts could see Britain spend upward of 400 billion pounds, or about 15 percent of GDP.

United States

In a sign of the staggering toll the virus was taking on the U.S. economy, more than thirty million Americans—about one in six U.S. workers—have filed for unemployment since mid-March. Before this crisis, the highest number of filings in a single week was 695,000, in 1982. Economic output plunged by nearly 5 percent in the first three months of 2020, the steepest dive since 2008. Most analysts expect the damage to be far worse in the second quarter, with some suggesting that the unemployment rate could reach as high as 40 percent, significantly higher than its peak of 25 percent during the Great Depression.

While Washington has been criticized for mismanaging the public health response to the pandemic, it’s also been credited with moving decisively to stabilize financial markets. In March, the Federal Reserve indicated that it will do anything within its power to support the economy and provide liquidity. Among the Fed’s historic actions have been: cutting interest rates close to zero, reducing bank reserve requirements to zero, rapidly purchasing nearly $2 trillion in Treasury bonds and mortgage-backed securities, buying corporate and municipal debt, and extending emergency credit to nonbanks.

Meanwhile, on the fiscal side, lawmakers passed a $2 trillion stimulus package in March that some analysts have characterized as a bridge loan to get the U.S. economy through the crisis. It includes direct payments of up to $1200 to individuals, hundreds of billions of dollars in loans and grants to businesses, increases to unemployment benefits, and support for hospitals and health-care providers. “In effect, this is a wartime level of investment into our nation,” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. A month later, Congress signed off on a second bailout package, this one totaling close to a half billion dollars and aimed at providing relief to small businesses and more aid to hospitals.

Multilateral Institutions

European Union. Eurozone finance ministers agreed to a 500-billion-euro package to provide emergency lending and other assistance to member countries, businesses, and workers. Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank (ECB), has promised there will be “no limits” on the ECB’s defense of the eurozone. The bank is set to buy up to 750 billion euros in additional bonds this year to help its members amid the downturn.

International Monetary Fund. The IMF has set aside $100 billion to lend to member countries that are facing acute financial crises because of the coronavirus, with preference given to emerging economies. By early April, more than ninety countries had requested bailouts.

World Bank Group. President David Malpass said the bank was committing more than $150 billion to counter the pandemic’s effects. More than two dozen virus-related loan requests have been fast-tracked, with many more in the pipeline. Thus far, India has received the largest loan at $1 billion.

Source: https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/coronavirus-how-are-countries-responding-economic-crisis

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In a nod to the risk those restrictions pose to the world’s third-largest economy, however, Abe promised to end restrictions earlier if experts advised him he could do so at a coronavirus task force due to meet on May 14.

He also said that the lockdown could be eased slightly in places with few infections and that libraries and museums across the country could reopen to limited numbers of visitors.

“May will be a month where we need to end this pandemic. It will also be a month where we will prepare for the next stage,” Abe said at a press conference.

Sitting next to Abe, his leading expert and adviser Shigeru Omi noted that infection rates were falling even as testing was expanded, but he admitted that Japan was still only testing at around half of its daily capacity of 15,000. He urged people to socially distance, wear masks, and wash their hands.

Even though Japan has not seen a huge outbreak compared with some global hotspots, there are 15,965 recorded cases, including 712 from the cruise ship previously quarantined in Yokohama, and 568 deaths, according to public broadcaster NHK.

Abe urged the public to prepare for a long battle against the virus and asked them to continue practicing social distancing. People would need to adopt a “new lifestyle” for the coronavirus era, he said.

The government is spending $1.1 trillion, equivalent to a fifth of GDP, on stimulus measures to help companies and people hurt by the pandemic and lockdown measures.

On Monday, Abe promised additional steps to ease the economic impact of the lockdown, including money to cover rent payments, an expansion of aid to protect jobs and help for part-time workers who have lost their jobs.

“We will take action and act quickly to assist businesses and households,” Abe said.

Unlike other governments that have forced businesses to close and ordered people to stay home, Abe’s administration is only able to request compliance with coronavirus measures, meaning some bars and restaurants in heavily infected cities such as Tokyo and elsewhere remain open.

In 13 prefectures including Tokyo and Osaka that have been the hardest hit, the government is aiming to reduce the number of people in busy shopping and entertainment districts by 80%.

Abe on Monday apologized for failing to achieve that goal in most places and said the reduction target will remain, in a bid to push new infections below 100 a day, or fewer than the number of recovered people leaving the hospital.

In sign that the lockdown measures were working, his advisers, however, said that those infected were already on average passing the virus on to less than one person.

But Kenji Shibuya, director of the Institute of Population Health at King’s College London, said the experts were “sending a conflicting message”.

They say that the contact rate between people is not down enough but that the reproduction rate is below one, “so it is difficult to tell on which basis they did reach the conclusion to extend the declaration,” Shibuya said.

The post Japan’s Abe extends state of emergency to May 31 first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Abe announced the state of emergency targeting the capital Tokyo and six other prefectures – accounting for about 44 per cent of Japan’s population – for a period of about one month.

“We have decided to declare a state of emergency because we’ve judged that a fast spread of the coronavirus nationwide would have an enormous impact on lives and the economy,” he told Parliament earlier.

His cabinet will also finalize the stimulus package worth 108 trillion yen ($US990 billion) – equal to 20 percent of Japan’s economic output – to cushion the impact of the epidemic on the world’s third-largest economy.

Abe said direct fiscal spending would amount to 39 trillion yen, or 7 percent of the economy, more than double the amount Japan spent following the 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers.

Japan has been spared the big outbreaks of the coronavirus seen in other global hot spots, but a recent, steady rise in infections in Tokyo, Osaka, and other areas led to growing calls for Abe to announce a state of emergency.

Coronavirus infections in Tokyo more than doubled to about 1,200 in the past week, with more than 80 new ones reported on Tuesday, accounting for the highest number in the country.

The post Japan’s Shinzo Abe declares a state of emergency first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Donald Trump has brushed off North Korea’s warning of a “Christmas gift”, saying the United States would “deal with it very successfully” and that perhaps it would be a “nice present”.

The US president added: “Maybe it’s a present where he sends me a beautiful vase.”

Kim Jong Un is demanding sanctions relief by the end of the year

The US has imposed tough sanctions, insisting North Korea ends all nuclear activity before they can be lifted.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un had threatened to take unspecified action if sanctions relief is not forthcoming by the end of the year.

The North has said that what “Christmas gift” it gives the United States depends on Washington’s actions.

Meanwhile, leaders from China, Japan, and South Korea have reiterated their commitment to ending North Korea’s nuclear and missile programmes at a trilateral summit.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said the three agreed that “dialogue and consultation is the only effective way to solve the issues of the Korea Peninsula”.

“We three countries are willing to work together with the international community to solve the issue of the Korea Peninsula in a political way,” Mr. Li said at a joint news conference following the meeting.

Mr. Li, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and South Korean President Moon Jae-in also said they discussed furthering regional co-operation on the economy, the environment, and people-to-people exchanges.

“We all advocate for free trade and promote economic integration. China holds that safeguarding free trade benefits the protection of multilateralism, of world peace,” Mr. Li said.

In his comments, Mr. Moon said the sides agreed to support efforts to restart talks between Washington and Pyongyang so that “denuclearisation and peace… could actually advance”.

Mr. Abe echoed that stance in his remarks, criticizing North Korean missile launches as violating UN resolutions and seriously threatening regional security.

“For that purpose, it was confirmed that full implementation of UN Security Council resolutions remains important, and we need to maintain the momentum of the US-North Korea process,” Mr. Abe said.

Although China is Pyongyang’s most important source of investment, diplomatic support, and economic aid, it has shown little success in convincing Mr. Kim’s government to abandon its nuclear arsenal.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/well-deal-with-it-donald-trump-brushes-off-kim-jong-uns-threat-of-christmas-gift-11894827

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BEIJING (REUTERS) – The leaders of Japan and South Korea will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Monday (Dec 23), amid heightened concern that North Korea may be about to return to confrontation with Washington.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will meet Mr. Xi separately before going to the south-western city of Chengdu for a trilateral meeting with Chinese Premier Li Keqiang.

Though various economic matters will also be on the agenda – as well as tensions between Seoul and Tokyo – North Korea appears likely to dominate the agenda.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un held a meeting of top military officials to discuss boosting the country’s military capability, state news agency reported on Sunday.

North Korea has set a year-end deadline for the United States to change what it says is a policy of hostility amid a stalemate in efforts to make progress on their pledge to end the North’s nuclear programme and establish lasting peace.

Mr. Kim and US President Donald Trump have met three times since June 2018, but there has been no substantive progress in dialogue while the North demanded crushing international sanctions be lifted first.

On Saturday, the state media said the US would “pay dearly” for taking issue with the North’s human rights record, and said Washington’s “malicious words” would only aggravate tensions on the Korean peninsula.

US special envoy for North Korea Stephen Biegun met two senior Chinese diplomats during his two-day visit to Beijing last week, following similar meetings in South Korea and Japan days earlier, as diplomats made last-ditch attempts to prevent a new confrontation.

Beijing, jointly with Russia, proposed last week that the United Nations Security Council lift some sanctions in what it calls an attempt to break the current deadlock and seek to build support.

But it is unclear whether Beijing can convince Seoul and Tokyo to break ranks from Washington, which has made its opposition clear and can veto any resolution.

Though South Korea sees China as instrumental in reviving negotiations, it has so far sidestepped questions on whether it supports the new proposal by Beijing and Moscow. Japan, which has historically been a staunch supporter of sanctions against North Korea, has also refrained from commenting on the proposal.

Source: https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/chinese-president-xi-jinping-to-meet-japan-south-korea-leaders-as-north-korea

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US President Donald Trump has been adamant about reducing its trade deficit with other nations, while two-thirds of Japan’s trade surplus with the US comprises vehicle sales [File: Kiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg]

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A protester in Seoul holds a defaced image of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe during a rally denouncing the Japanese government on July 17. Photo: AP

On July 1, Tokyo announced stricter controls on exporting materials essential to South Korea’s semiconductor industry. The restrictions followed the Korean Supreme Court’s decision allowing alleged victims of colonial Japanese forced labour or their surviving family members to seize assets of the successors of colonial-era Japanese companies, and Korean President Moon Jae-in’s rejections of Japan’s proposal for diplomatic consultation or third-party arbitration.

Japan believes the decision violates the two countries’ 1965 Treaty on Basic Relations. Moon responded by declaring that South Korea will diversify sources of industrial components.

Both Seoul and Tokyo’s actions are considered overdue, democratic expressions by South Korea’s left and Japan’s right-wing parties.

Since the Park Chung-hee regime signed the 1965 treaty with Tokyo, normalizing relations and ostensibly resolving colonial-era claims, left-wing activists have characterized it as the work of pro-Japanese collaborators contravening the Korean people’s wishes. Anti-Japanese populism entered mainstream public discourse during Korea’s democratic transition in the 1990s. The narrative gained traction as left-leaning Korean administrations became less willing to enforce bilateral treaties and international agreements regarding Japan.

South Korea is the only Asian state to expropriate Japanese company assets to compensate wartime labourers, or allow statues of the “comfort women” and other colonial-era victims on streets facing Japanese diplomatic installations, contravening the 1961 and 1963 Vienna Conventions. The Moon administration also unilaterally dissolved the “comfort women” foundation, negating the 2015 accord signed by the Park Geun-hye government, after Tokyo paid 1 billion yen (more than US$9.2 million) compensation.

South Korean protesters sit near a statue of a girl symbolizing former “comfort women” forced into sexual slavery, at a demonstration in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul in November 2018. Photo: AFP

As Korea’s left-wing undermined post-1965 treaty constraints, Japan’s far-right campaigned to break Tokyo’s policy of restraint against formerly occupied Asian countries; the court decision and Moon’s refusal to arbitrate fractured Japan’s consensus favoring moderation.

The post Why the South Korea-Japan trade dispute may not be resolvable first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.