0306-Japan’s new provocation

Japan’s central government Friday dispatched a vice-ministerial official to a ceremony aimed at promoting its territorial claims on Korea’s easternmost islets of Dokdo. More than 10 Japanese lawmakers and right-wing figures also attended the event.

This is the first time that Tokyo has sent a government official to the so-called "Takeshima Day," annually hosted by the Shimane prefectural government. Takeshima is the Japanese name for Dokdo.

The dispatch is another provocation following its creation of an agency exclusively responsible for territorial issues, including Dokdo, under the direct control of the Prime Minister’s Office.

We see the dispatch as an act "going against history," as a Korean foreign ministry spokesman warned, and urged Seoul to take appropriate measures. This incident will certainly aggravate the already-strained Seoul-Tokyo relations.

It’s quite disappointing and frustrating to confirm a two-faced Japan once again, given that the neighboring country will send Taro Aso, its deputy prime minister and minister of finance, as a special envoy to President-elect Park Geun-hye’s inauguration ceremony on Monday.

Even the Japanese press has been skeptical of Japan playing up the Dokdo issue in the middle of Seoul’s power transition. In an editorial, the Asahi Shimbun strongly urged the Japanese administration to reconsider sending Aiko Shimajiri, a parliamentary secretary of the Cabinet Office, to the ceremony, arguing that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe "needs to assess this matter in the broader context of Japan’s relations with South Korea."

We concur with this paper’s notion and sincerely hope that Abe will try his best to build a trustful relationship with Seoul’s first female president as soon as possible, as he said earlier. It simply defies our understanding that the Japanese prime minister says one thing and does another.

Still, it’s encouraging that Abe has yet to upgrade the "Takeshima Day" event despite his election pledge to let the central government host the ceremony every year. Considering that both Seoul and Tokyo are in the initial stages of new administrations, Abe and the Japanese government should have been more cautious.

We feel it unnecessary to any longer refute Japan’s absurd claims to Dokdo and want to emphasize that Japan’s wayward provocations are just for internal political purposes and will result in international isolation of the island country running deeper. For both Seoul and Tokyo, now is a crucial time to put their heads together to find a solution to North Korea’s nuclear ambitions.