SEOUL– South Korea hopes to strengthen cooperation with Japan under its new Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, a Cheong Wa Dae official said Friday in response to the Japanese leader’s message on South Korea in a parliamentary speech.
In his first keynote address at a parliamentary session as prime minister earlier Friday, Kishida said he will “strongly” demand South Korea take “appropriate” measures to end drawn-out diplomatic stand-offs between the two sides and restore healthy bilateral relations.
In response to Kishida’s message, a senior Cheong Wa Dae official said Seoul “anticipates to communicate and cooperate with Japan to develop its relationship into a future-oriented one.”
The official also stressed the need to “collect the wisdom” in order to solve pending issues between the two countries. “Both countries need to work together in order to strengthen practical cooperation in various areas,” the official added.
A senior Seoul foreign ministry official also expressed hope for better relations with Japan.
The tone of Kishida’s remarks on South Korea was similar to that of his predecessor Yoshihide Suga in his parliamentary speech delivered a month after his inauguration last September.
The two sides are locked in disputes over shared history, especially Japan’s wartime forced labor and sexual slavery during its brutal colonial rule of Korea from 1910-45.
Source: Yonhap News Agency