Japan yesterday postponed an ocean survey of islands controlled by South Korea and diplomats of the neighboring countries tried to defuse the emotionally charged row.
Tokyo may dispatch a Foreign Ministry official to Seoul to resolve a standoff over disputed islets, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi suggested yesterday.
News reports had earlier said Undersecretary for Foreign Affairs Shotaro Yachi may travel to Seoul as early as today to hold talks over the plan to survey resource-rich waters near the islets, which Japan also claims.
PHOTO: AFP
When asked about the reports, Koizumi said Japan would do its utmost to reach an amicable solution. But both sides refused to back down.
"We want to avoid any unexpected event so we are holding talks at the level of vice ministers and ambassadors," Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso said earlier yesterday.
South Korea maintained its show of force, dispatching a surveillance plane to the disputed area, putting its coast guard on full alert and summoning the Japanese ambassador for a 40-minute dressing down.
Hundreds of riot police guarded the Japanese embassy in Seoul as a group of about 20 protesters burned Japanese flags and portraits of Koizumi, one day after an activist attempted ritual suicide.
The Japanese coast guard said it had delayed the departure of the two ships to the islands -- called Dokdo in South Korea and Takeshima in Japan -- citing strong winds.
The ships have been docked since Wednesday just off the port of Sakaiminato in the southeast.
"We have not decided whether to start the survey," coast guard spokesman Naoki Mori said. "We've been consulting with the central government."
But Japan this week announced it would take measurements for a map of features on the seabed of the disputed islands. Tokyo said it needed the survey to submit a counterproposal to South Korea at a June meeting of the International Hydrographic Organization. At the conference, the group will consider using Korean names for the underwater features of the islands.
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
North Korea has detained another official over last week’s failed launch of a warship, which damaged the naval destroyer, state media reported yesterday. Pyongyang announced “a serious accident” at Wednesday last week’s launch ceremony, which crushed sections of the bottom of the new destroyer. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the mishap a “criminal act caused by absolute carelessness.” Ri Hyong-son, vice department director of the Munitions Industry Department of the Party Central Committee, was summoned and detained on Sunday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. He was “greatly responsible for the occurrence of the serious accident,” it said. Ri is the fourth person
The collapse of the Swiss Birch glacier serves as a chilling warning of the escalating dangers faced by communities worldwide living under the shadow of fragile ice, particularly in Asia, experts said. Footage of the collapse on Wednesday showed a huge cloud of ice and rubble hurtling down the mountainside into the hamlet of Blatten. Swiss Development Cooperation disaster risk reduction adviser Ali Neumann said that while the role of climate change in the case of Blatten “still needs to be investigated,” the wider impacts were clear on the cryosphere — the part of the world covered by frozen water. “Climate change and
RSS