South Korea denied Japanese media reports Monday that South Korea's foreign minister asked for the resumption of a summit between the two nations during his recent meeting with Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe, who is favored to become Japan's next prime minister.
"There were no remarks on either a South Korea-Japan summit on the sidelines of the APEC meeting in November or a South Korea visit by Japan's next leader when Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon had the meeting," South Korea's Foreign Ministry said in a press release.
Ban only expressed hopes that the two countries will soon normalize ties strained by historical and territorial issues by clearing away negative factors, it added.
Relations between Seoul and Tokyo have been chilled in recent years due to the Japanese prime minister's annual visits to a war shrine in Tokyo and Japan's attempt to gloss over its wartime past.
Japan also claims the sovereignty over the South Korean islets of Dokdo in the East Sea.
South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun has suspended summits with his Japanese counterpart in protest.
Japanese media reported earlier in the day that Ban expressed willingness to resume the summits and invited Abe to South Korea after he succeeds Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi.
Ban was in Tokyo early August to attend the funeral of Japan's former prime minister Ryutaro Hashimoto, and met with Abe.
Abe, known for his hard-line stance on foreign affairs, formally declared his bid last week, and he is almost certain to take office as Japan's new prime minister later this month.
Some analysts in Seoul raised hopes of a breakthrough to the Seoul-Tokyo standoff with the new leader, but government officials remain cautious.
Abe has yet to clarify whether he will visit the Yasukuni Shrine, where 2.5 million Japanese war dead, including 14 Class-A war criminals, are enshrined.
As part of efforts to explore ways of improving ties, Japan's Vice Foreign Minister Shotaro Yachi is due in Seoul on Wednesday.
But the Japanese Embassy in Seoul said his exact itinerary has not been decided yet.
South Korea and Japan were also set for talks later in the day on how to define the boundary of their exclusive economic zones in the waters between the two sides, which remains unclear because of the Dokdo issue.
No concrete deal is expected in the working-level negotiation, the sixth in its kind, however, officials said.
Seoul, Sept. 4 (Yonhap News)
Seoul denies reports of move for summit with Tokyo |
