[Editorial] Abe’s decision to attend Pyeongchang Olympics is a welcome announcement

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced on Jan. 24 that he will be attending the opening ceremony for the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang. It’s welcome news. As Abe said, the Olympics are a “festival of peace.” It seems unnatural for the Prime Minister of neighboring Japan not to attend when President Emmanuel Macron of France and many other heads of state will be traveling long distances to be there. It’s also in Japan’s practical interest to carry on the Olympic spirit as host country for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.

If anything, it is Japan that was in the wrong with its attempt late last year to tie its displeasures with the findings of a South Korean government task force on the two sides’ comfort women agreement to the matter of Abe’s attendance at the Pyeongchang opening ceremony. In announcing his plans to attend, Abe said he wanted to “clearly state Japan’s position on the comfort women agreement to President Moon Jae-in.” He also reportedly demanded the removal of comfort women statues in an interview with the Sankei Shimbun newspaper.

We are all well aware of Japan’s position in favor of honoring the agreement reached by the last administration. There’s nothing surprising either about Abe making such arguments in the context of a South Korea-Japan summit. But it’s inappropriate for him to announce on the eve of his first South Korea visit in a long time – one intended for the opening ceremony of the Olympics – that his first order of business is picking bones. It’s also not a courteous way to act toward a neighbor that has its hands full trying to get ready for the Games.

If Abe does come, it will be the Prime Minister’s first South Korea visit since Moon took office. It will also be his first visit in the more than two years since a trilateral summit with China in Nov. 2015. Meeting during the G20 Summit in Hamburg last July, Moon and Abe agreed to restore “shuttle diplomacy” – but that plan has failed to pan out. The main reason is obviously the two sides’ conflict over the comfort women issue.

As the Foreign Ministry Task Force in charge of evaluating the agreement has stated, however, the comfort women issue isn’t something that it is going to be resolved quickly through brief diplomatic negotiations. It’s also more than a matter of mere diplomacy – one that encompasses issues of universal human rights. It’s going to require a tough process of resolving differences over a long time frame from a perspective of women’s human rights.

For this reason, the comfort women matter should properly be addressed separately from other issues of security and the economy. The Park Geun-hye administration experienced what happens by attempting to link this to South Korea-Japan relations as a whole. Neither South Korea nor Japan has any reason, need, or time to repeat that mistake. Abe’s visit should be an occasion for adopting a mature and effective attitude in restoring shuttle diplomacy and adopting a two-track approach to improving relations with Japan.

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