뉴스레터

The international conference on "Reflection upon the Korea-Japan Agreement in 1965 and Future Prospects for a Peace Community" was held on June 22 to 23, 2015, in continuation of the series of conferences that the Northeast Asian History Foundation had organized from 2011 to 2014 in order to review: 1) Japan's colonial responsibility for crimes against humanity, such as military sexual slavery and forced labor, in the commission of which state power had been used; 2) the 1965 Korea-Japan Agreement system; and 3) the rulings of the Constitutional Court of Korea in 2011 and of the Supreme Court of Korea in 2012 and their implications and challenges ahead.

In its fifth year this year, also marking the 50th anniversary of the Korea-Japan Agreement, this international conference was designed in response to the need to address the topic "Reflection on the Korea-Japan Agreement in 1965 and Future Prospects for a Peace Community" on the basis of historical truth and justice in international law which had been explored and discussed over the past four years. The conference consisted of keynote speeches, five presentation sessions (Session I Review of the Five Decades since the South Korea-Japan Treaty; Session II Japan's Colonial Responsibility According to International Law; Session III The South Korea-Japan Treaty System and Remaining Tasks; Session IV The 1965 South Korea-Japan Treaty at Present and a Pending Peace Community; and Session V The Search for a Northeast Asian Peace Community and its Prospects), and a general discussion session.

Keynote Lectures by Veteran Scholars from Korea and Japan Who Lived through the Period of Japanese Colonial Rule and Aggression

CHI Ik-pyo, the first president of Legal Aid Society for Civil Victims of Japanese Colonial Rule, is a veteran lawyer from Korea, and ARAI Shinichi (荒井信一), a professor emeritus at Surugadai University, is a veteran historian from Japan, both of whom lived through the period of Japanese colonial rule and wars of aggression. They opened each day of the conference from June 22 to 23 with their keynote lectures which looked back on the five decades since the Korea-Japan Agreement and examined the tasks ahead in building a peace community.

In Session I, Alexis Dudden, a professor at the University of Connecticut who initiated the joint statement by historians around the world critical of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's perception of history, gave a presentation on 'Japanese Colonial Responsibility and 'Comfort Women' in History and International Law' in which she asserted that Japan was both legally and morally responsible for the horrible crimes against humanity. In my presentation on 'Review of Juridical Decisions since the South Korea-Japan Treaty and Tasks Ahead,' I gave a review of the rulings of the Korean judiciary and international trends for relief of the victims of Japanese colonial rule, and emphasized the need to establish positive peace on the basis of respect for human rights as a universal value of humanity. MA Guang (馬光), professor at Zhejiang University, analyzed the rulings in Korea and their implications in his presentation on 'South Korean Rulings on Aiding the Rights of Victims of Japanese Colonial Rule and Implications for China,' arguing that the Chinese court should also handle cases and make accurate decisions on the basis of law, recognizing that they are carrying out historic missions.

In Session II, MAEDA Akira (前田朗), professor at Tokyo Zokei University, presented a paper on 'Colonial crimes and crimes against humanity in International Criminal Law' which demonstrated that the concept of crimes of colonial dominion, which was omitted by the UN's International Law Commission (ILC) in 1995, had since escalated into global tasks such as the liquidation of colonialism and the regulation of hate speech. SUK Kwang-hyun, professor at Seoul National University, gave a presentation on 'Review of Illegal Acts in Japanese Colonies According to Private International Law,' which attached significance to the Korean Supreme Court's ruling in its declaration of the nullity of the legal relation arising from Japan's illegal rule which was incompatible with the spirit of the Korean Constitution. GUAN Jianqiang (管建强), professor at East China University of Political Science and Law, gave a presentation titled 'On the Subjects of Rights and Obligations to Remedy the Civil Victims of War' in which he said that Korea, unlike Japan, was acting as the subject of rights and obligations in the enforcement of international humanitarian law.

Addressing the Human Rights of the Victims of Japanese Imperialism as a Step Toward a Peace Community

In Session III, Yi Yang-soo, Deputy Secretary General of Collective for Complete Declassification of Records on Proceedings of the South Korea-Japan Talks, presented a summary of the 10 years of the trial proceedings to point out that what matters most is to respect and reflect the opinions of the victims of Japanese imperialism. Jinhee J. LEE, a professor at Eastern Illinois University who identified Kang Dae-heung, a Korean man killed by vigilantes in the aftermath of the 1923 Great Kanto earthquake, stressed the importance of cooperation and solidarity for the liquidation of colonialist violence in the post-colonialism and post-Cold War era. HIGUCHI Naoto (樋口直人), professor at Tokushima University, gave a presentation on 'Historical Revisionism and Chauvinism,' explaining that the targeting of the Korean Japanese by the Japanese-style chauvinism grounded in colonialism and the Cold War was the expression of the desire to deny the history of Japan as a colonizer.

In Session IV, on June 23, TOTSUKA Etsuro (戶塚悅朗), former Japanese lawyer, demanded that Japan should take responsibility for leaving the legacy of its colonial rule by normalizing its diplomatic relations with Korea without repentance or apology for the 1905 Eulsa Treaty and its forced annexation of Korea in 1910, both of which were absolutely invalid according to the 1963 Report of the ILC. OTA Osamu (太田修), professor at Doshisha University. identified the argument that 'the Korea-Japan Agreement had settled the claims arising from colonial rule and war' as the reason why the responsibility for such claims remains unresolved, and stressed the importance of continued dialogue for liquidation of the past. LEE Young-chae (李永采), professor at Keisen University, spoke in relation to peace education in universities across Japan, stressing the need to raise an awareness of peace that not only denies 'peace under structured violence' but also values life and relationship with others.

In Session V, Werner Pfennig, professor at Freie Universität Berlin, gave a presentation on 'Lessons of Historical Reconciliation and Peace Community in Europe,' stressing the need to work toward building a peace community through the expansion of social institutions that promote historical reconciliation and of positive interdependence. KATSUMURA Makoto (勝村誠), professor at Ritsumeikan University, gave a presentation on 'Ahn Jung-geun's "On Peace in East Asia" and the Search for a Northeast Asian Peace Community,' proposing to build a peace community in the East Asian region where power politics dominated by putting the conditions for dialogue in place with Mr. Ahn's peace initiative as a guide.

This international conference was an important event which, through presentation and general discussion by experts of authority from Europe as well as Korea, China, and Japan, reflected on the fifty years since the Korea-Japan Agreement in 1965 with an in-depth exploration and sharing of future prospects for a peace community and tasks ahead at a time when the issues of calling for taking 'colonial responsibility and making compensation for 'colonial damage' are beginning to be raised globally.

We should make sure that this year of 2015, marking the 70th anniversary of liberation and half a century since the Korea-Japan Agreement, will be the first year of building a Northeast Asian peace community by doing justice to history by 'addressing the human rights of the victims of Japanese colonial rule.'