This year marks the 40th anniversary of the normalization of relations between Japan and The Republic of Korea in 1965. It also falls on the 100th anniversary of the conclusion of the Second Korea-Japan Agreement (referred to in South Korea as the "Ulsa (1905) protectorate treaty"), based on which Japan seized diplomatic sovereignty over the old Empire of Korea and embarked on the colonization of the Korean Peninsula. The Korean people look, in fact, with mixed feelings at the history of relations between the two countries. There are, nevertheless, a number of commemorative events under the banner of "Japan-Korea Friendship Year 2005" aimed at building up an amicable and future-oriented mutual relationship.

Against these backdrops, the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade recently made public for the first time a part of the records of negotiation for the South Korean claims against Japan, which took place in the Normalization Talks between the two countries. The Ministry is, furthermore, poised to make all of the negotiation-related documents available to the public by August this year, provided that the Japanese government should concurs. Behind this move, according to Korean government sources, is South Korea's intention to prevent past problems from fettering future relations of the two countries by clearing off legacies of the colonial period.

In any event, it seems as if the Normalization Talks that ended half a century ago was once again put on a stage for public scrutiny by those sufferers demanding individual compensation and people critical of South Korea's past approaches to negotiations. Some national assemblymen are said to make a motion for an Assembly resolution seeking renegotiation of Korea-Japan agreements of 1965 but that would be an act against international good faith and something unrealistic from legal and diplomatic points of view. However, since issues such as military comfort women, those Koreans left behind in Sakhalin after the Would War­¶ and A-bomb victims were not discussed at the time of the 1965 talks, they should be preferably settled amicably through continued consultations between the two countries.

Of the Korea-Japan Normalization Talks that began in 1951, the overall frame of claim issue was more or less settled by the Kim-Ohira memorandum between Mr. Kim Jong-Pil, then the chief of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency and Mr. Masayoshi Ohira, then the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs. Japan agreed in the memorandum to pay South Korea 300 million dollars in grant, 200 million dollars in government loans, and 100 million dollars or more in commercial loans. However, in South Korea, there were strong voices of discontent and anger against the amounts, accusing the government of its "humiliating diplomacy" and denouncing that: "Is that all we get for 36 years under the Japanese rule?" In the wake of a series of anti-government demonstrations and protest rallies across the country in June 1964, the government had to proclaim martial law to quell the unrest.

The question of the amounts Japan was to pay had lingered even after the normalization. When then Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone paid a visit to Seoul in 1983, the issue developed into Japan's extension of special economic cooperation to South Korea, which amounted to a total of 4 billion dollars in governmental ODA and other forms. This, however, invited some displeasure among Japanese, who regarded it as the second round of negotiation for the normalization.

On the other hand, Japan has extended to China, which gave up a claim for war reparations, economic cooperation with ODA funds amounting to about 3 trillion yen up to the year 2004. This represents the strenuous endeavors that have been made by Japan for the sake of promoting goodwill and friendship since the 1972 normalization of Sino-Japanese relations. The new Beijing airport opened in 1999 was one of the projects in which a part of Japan's ODA funds was invested. Nevertheless, Chinese side was reluctant to make it known to the Chinese public to which Japanese side regretted.

The situation, such as above may have something to do with discrepancies that exist in the question of recognition of history between the governments and peoples of Japan and South Korea and those between Japan and China. May I be the only one who perceived it in such a way?

Now the relations between South Korea and Japan have remarkably turned for the better. As a neighbor in East Asia, I am concerned about the current Japan-China relationship, which is being buffeted over the question of historical perception on the past. According to recent reports, Japan and China are likely to hold a high-level "strategic dialogue" on a regular basis in the same way as Japan does with the United States. I earnestly hope amicable relationship could be cultivated between the two countries through such dialogues.

Mr. Richard L. Armitage, former U.S. deputy secretary of state, said in a recent interview with an Australian newspaper that the U.S.-China relationship today is in a more favorable state than was the case under any previous administrations, because of successful diplomacy during the first term of the Bush administration. Regretfully, there are some Japanese writers and columnist who hold the view that, as long as the Japan-U.S. relationship remains solid, China's hard-line posture poses no problem for Japan at all. However, they should rethink that it is impossible to build a community to usher in a new era of cooperation among the nations in East Asia without collaboration between Japan and China.