Kishida promises a rapprochement with North Korea to solve the issue of the hostages

Oct. 23 (EUROPA PRESS) –

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said on Sunday that he would try to rebuild relations with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to help resolve the issue of Japanese abducted by North Korean agents in the 1970s and 1980s.

Thus, Kishida has expressed his willingness to meet with Kim “at any time and without prior conditions” and has promised to “do everything possible to achieve it,” according to Japanese public television NHK.

Kishida has made this announcement during a meeting with relatives of the victims of these kidnappings. “It is very unfortunate that none of the abductees have returned to Japan since 2002,” Kishida said.

The Japanese leader explained that his government intends to provide a comprehensive solution to all pending bilateral issues, such as kidnap victims and the North Korean nuclear and ballistic programs to “close a regrettable past and normalize relations in line with the Pyongyang Declaration of 2002”.

Since five of the kidnapped citizens returned to Japanese territory in 2002, Japan has been fighting for the return of twelve others who were forcibly transferred to North Korean territory to teach spies the Japanese language and culture.

For Kishida, the kidnapped are a pressing Human Rights issue because the relatives of the victims are getting older.

The Pyongyang Declaration was signed during the visit of the then Japanese Prime Minister, Junichiro Koizumi, to Pyongyang, where he met with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, father of the current leader. North Korea acknowledges in that statement the kidnappings and formally apologizes for them. Both countries thus agreed to collaborate to achieve the normalization of diplomatic relations.

However, recently Pyongyang has assured that the kidnapping dispute “is already resolved” and has warned that bilateral relations could worsen unless Tokyo “changes its position on the kidnapping issue.”

Japan colonized the Korean peninsula from 1910 until the end of World War II. At the moment, Tokyo and Pyongyang do not have diplomatic relations.