Ishiba Makes Last Foreign Visit to South Korea

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba visited Busan, the second largest city of the Republic of Korea, on September 30th, in a series of mutual visits by the leaders of both countries, which is called “shuttle diplomacy.” In their summit meeting, Iashiba reconfirmed with ROK president Lee Jae Myung their intention to stably develop bilateral relations of their countries and continue communication on various aspects including security, even after Ishiba would step down as prime minister in mid-October.

It was the first meeting of both leaders since they had met in Tokyo in August, trying to prove that their shuttle diplomacy was working. Ishiba insisted that he hoped Japan and ROK to make most frequent exchanges than any other countries. Lee expected further advance of the bilateral relations through their shuttle diplomacy. Ishiba visited a grave of Lee Soo-hyun before the meeting, who lost his life when jumped down on the railway of Shin-Okubo station and hit buy a train, trying to save a Japanese man in 2001.

 

Both readers acknowledged close cooperation among Japan, ROK and the United States toward complete denuclearization of Korean Peninsula. Ishiba thanked for support of ROK on abduction of Japanese citizens by North Korea. They also agreed on establishing Japan-ROK Cooperation Committee on Science and Technology.

 

It is the first time for a Japanese prime minister to visit a local city in South Korea since 2004, when Junichiro Koizumi visited Jeju Island and had a meeting with president Roh Moo-hyun. Lee proposed a meeting in local city in South Korea to discuss local revitalization, an agenda which Ishiba has been earnestly grappling with. Busan is known as having serious problem of low birth rate.

 

Japan and ROK shares common problem of low birth rate, few marriages and centralization of population to the capital. Both leaders agreed on maintaining a discussion body to talk about various social issues including low birth rate, depopulation, local revitalization, demographic concentration to the capital, agriculture, disaster prevention and suicide.

 

One great concern for Ishiba is how to hand out this achievement in bilateral relations with the ROK to his successor. It is estimated that two hopeful candidates, Shinjiro Koizumi and Sanae Takaichi, in the presidential election of the Liberal Democratic Party are regular visitor to Yasukuni Shrine, in which Japanese war criminals are enshrined. Ishiba hoped to solidify the shuttle diplomacy with the ROK before he leaves his office.

 

Visit to Busan marked Ishiba’s last foreign visit as the prime minister. In his address to the memorial ceremony of war dead on August 15, Ishiba included ”remorse” on the past to neighbor countries in Asia. “No country can forge the path to a bright future unless it squarely faces history,” said Ishiba in his speech to the United Nations General Assembly in September. Fixing tangled relationship with Asian country must be one of the most important agenda for Ishiba.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

LDP Kickoffs Presidential Election

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP)   kicked off  its presidential election campaign on September 22 and five lawmakers officially submitted their candidacy to the party. Having lost majority in both Houses of the Diet under the leadership of Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, the presidential election should be about how to regain power through reform of the party. Nevertheless, the candidates do not talk much about the reform, rather focusing on economic policies for the people or maneuvers to attract the opposition parties.   Those five candidates are former Minister on Economic Security Takayuki Kobayashi, former LDP Secretary General Toshimitsu Motegi, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi, former Minister on Economic Security Sanae Takaichi and Miniser of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Shinjiro Koizumi.   Kobayashi insists on temporary income tax cut with a fixed rate, which return is bigger for high-income taxpayers than them with low-income. Identifying h...
Read more

BOJ Begins to Sell ETF

The Bank of Japan (BOJ) decided to keep its short-term rate at 0.5 percent in its Monetary Policy Meeting on September 19 th . While it had been expected that the bank would not change the policy rate in the meeting, the meeting unanimously agreed on beginning to sell exchange-traded funds (ETF). Although the policy reflected the bank’s determination for normalizing its monetary policy, the Governor of JOB, Kazuo Ueda, predicted that it would take a hundred years to release all the ETF it possesses. While the BOJ started buying ETF, a financial product which is equivalent to investment trust, in 2010, the bank abruptly increased its quantity of purchase in 2013, under the leadership of then governor, Haruhiko Kuroda, who exchanged an accord with Shinzo Abe administration to cooperate to get rid of deflation and to achieve stable economic growth. The amount of ETF bought by the BOJ has reached 37 trillion yen.   Purchase of ETF by a central bank has been recognized as a prohibited m...
Read more

Contaminated Soil to Prime Minister’s Residence

Shigeru Ishiba Cabinet discussed how the radioactively contaminated soil in Fukushima prefecture would be treated and decided some of it should be used in Prime Minister’s Official Residence in Tokyo. Although the soil needs to be removed from Fukushima with legal requirement, the government of Japan has not found anywhere it should go. Ishiba administration hopes that the decision will pave the way for any local community to accept the soil.   Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant emitted a huge amount of radiation into the air, which contaminated the land surface around the site, in the severe accident in East Japan Great Earthquake in 2011. The contaminated soil in Fukushima prefecture was stocked in the intermediate stockyard built in the towns of Futaba and Okuma, where the power plant is located. The government promised the people in Fukushima to remove the soil out of Fukushima prefecture within thirty years, when it decided to build the stockyard in 2014.   The total a...
Read more