Tokyo: South Korea plans to hold its own memorial ceremony late next month to honor Korean victims who were forced to work at an old Japanese mine complex during Japan’s colonial rule of Korea, Seoul’s top envoy to Tokyo said Saturday. South Korean Ambassador to Japan Lee Hyuk unveiled the plan during an annual parliamentary audit of government agencies, held at the South Korean Embassy in Tokyo.

According to Yonhap News Agency, the planned memorial will be held at Sado mine in Japan’s Niigata Prefecture, off the west coast, separately from Japan’s annual memorial ceremony for the mine victims. Japan pledged to hold a memorial for the Sado mine victims when the mine was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site in late July last year. South Korea, however, boycotted the Japanese ceremony held in November last year and again in September this year, citing differences over how to honor the victims, including how to describe the coercive nature of Japan’s wartime labor mobilization. Instead, Seoul held its own ceremony two days after Japan’s inaugural event.

Regarding Seoul-Tokyo ties, Lee called for further cooperation between the two countries in various sectors. “It appears that closer security and defense cooperation among South Korea, the United States and Japan has become the trend of our time,” he said. “However, a trilateral military alliance is not an option.”

Asked about the Lee Jae Myung administration’s “two-track” policy of separating historical disputes from future-oriented cooperation with Japan, the envoy said “Korea will make absolutely no compromise on individual historical issues.” “But at the same time, it is important to ensure that these issues do not hinder the two countries’ efforts to constructively advance their relations,” he added.