Calls in South Korea for a boycott of Japanese goods in response to Tokyo’s curbs on the export of high-tech material to South Korea picked up yesterday, as a dispute over compensation for forced wartime labor roiled ties between the US allies.
It is the latest flash point in a relationship long overshadowed by South Korean resentment of Japan’s 1910 to 1945 occupation of the Korean Peninsula, in particular South Korean “comfort women,” a Japanese euphemism for women forced to work in Japanese military brothels before and during World War II.
Japan apologized to the women as part of a 2015 deal and provided a ￥1 billion (US$9.3 million at the current exchange rate) fund to help them.
Advocacy groups for the women have criticized the fund and South Korea dissolved it yesterday, despite Japan’s warnings that such action could damage ties.
“This is totally unacceptable for Japan. We’ve made stern representations to the South Korean side,” Japanese Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasutoshi Nishimura said in Tokyo.
The bitterness over the forced labor issue could disrupt global supplies of memory chips and smartphones.
Japan on Monday said that it would tighten restrictions on the export of high-tech materials used in smartphone displays and chips to South Korea.
The curbs took effect on Thursday, fueling South Korean calls for retaliation.
Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix — the world’s top memorychip makers and suppliers to Apple and China’s Huawei Technologies — could face delays if the curbs drag on.
“A boycott is the most immediate way for citizens to express their anger,” said Choi Gae-yeon of the activist group Movement for One Korea, which staged protests in front of a Japanese automaker’s showroom and a retailer in Seoul this week.
“Many people are angry at the attitude of the Japanese government,” she said.
The row over forced labor exploded last year, when a South Korean court ordered Japan’s Nippon Steel and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to pay hundreds of thousands of US dollars to South Korean plaintiffs.
Japan has maintained that the issue was fully settled in 1965, when the two countries restored diplomatic ties, and has denounced the ruling as “unthinkable.”
As of yesterday, nearly 27,000 people had signed a petition posted on the South Korean presidential office’s Web site calling for a boycott of Japanese products and for tourists not to visit.
The government must respond to a petition that gets 200,000 signatures in one month.
Some South Korean social media users posted “Boycott Japan” messages and shared a link to a list of Japanese brands that could be targeted, including Toyota and Uniqlo.
Toyota’s South Korean unit declined to comment and Uniqlo parent Fast Retailing’s South Korean unit did not have an immediate comment.
“Japan boycott movement” was among the most searched-for terms on South Korea’s main online search engine, Naver.
A South Korean actor on Thursday deleted photographs he posted on social media of a visit he made to Japan after online criticism.
South Korea last year imported US$54.6 billion of goods from Japan and paid for US$11.5 billion of its services.
South Korea last year exported US$30.5 billion in goods and US$8.7 billion in services to Japan, South Korean customs and central bank data showed.
IDENTITY: A sex extortion scandal involving Thai monks has deeply shaken public trust in the clergy, with 11 monks implicated in financial misconduct Reverence for the saffron-robed Buddhist monkhood is deeply woven into Thai society, but a sex extortion scandal has besmirched the clergy and left the devout questioning their faith. Thai police this week arrested a woman accused of bedding at least 11 monks in breach of their vows of celibacy, before blackmailing them with thousands of secretly taken photos of their trysts. The monks are said to have paid nearly US$12 million, funneled out of their monasteries, funded by donations from laypeople hoping to increase their merit and prospects for reincarnation. The scandal provoked outrage over hypocrisy in the monkhood, concern that their status
The United States Federal Communications Commission said on Wednesday it plans to adopt rules to bar companies from connecting undersea submarine communication cables to the US that include Chinese technology or equipment. “We have seen submarine cable infrastructure threatened in recent years by foreign adversaries, like China,” FCC Chair Brendan Carr said in a statement. “We are therefore taking action here to guard our submarine cables against foreign adversary ownership, and access as well as cyber and physical threats.” The United States has for years expressed concerns about China’s role in handling network traffic and the potential for espionage. The U.S. has
A disillusioned Japanese electorate feeling the economic pinch goes to the polls today, as a right-wing party promoting a “Japanese first” agenda gains popularity, with fears over foreigners becoming a major election issue. Birthed on YouTube during the COVID-19 pandemic, spreading conspiracy theories about vaccinations and a cabal of global elites, the Sanseito Party has widened its appeal ahead of today’s upper house vote — railing against immigration and dragging rhetoric that was once confined to Japan’s political fringes into the mainstream. Polls show the party might only secure 10 to 15 of the 125 seats up for grabs, but it is
The US Department of Education on Tuesday said it opened a foreign funding investigation into the University of Michigan (UM) while alleging it found “inaccurate and incomplete disclosures” in a review of the university’s foreign reports, after two Chinese scientists linked to the school were separately charged with smuggling biological materials into the US. As part of the investigation, the department asked the university to share, within 30 days, tax records related to foreign funding, a list of foreign gifts, grants and contracts with any foreign source, and other documents, the department said in a statement and in a letter to
RSS