Japan Press Weekly

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2017 November 29 - December 5 [JCP]

JCP strongly condemns North Korea’s ballistic missile launch and again calls for immediate direct talks to overcome the current crisis

Japanese Communist Party Chair Shii Kazuo on November 29 issued the following statement condemning North Korea’s latest ballistic missile launch:

Shii Kazuo
Chair, Japanese Communist Party
Member of the House of Representatives of Japan

Tokyo, Japan
November 29, 2017

North Korea in the early morning of November 29 again carried out a ballistic missile launch and the rocket fell into Japan’s exclusive economic zone in the Sea of Japan. Repeated nuclear tests and ballistic missile launches pose a grave threat to global and regional peace and stability as well as constitute a breach of a series of the UN Security Council resolutions, the joint statement of the Six-Party Talks, and the 2002 Pyongyang Declaration signed by Japan and North Korea.

The Japanese Communist Party strongly condemns North Korea’s reckless action.

A military clash must be avoided at any cost because it will cause tremendous loss and destruction.

The JCP strongly demands that North Korea comply with the UNSC resolutions and stop engaging in any further military provocations. We also call on all states concerned to refrain from exercising military actions that exacerbate tensions.

The JCP has been strongly calling on the United States and North Korea to enter into direct talks to overcome the current crisis. This has become a more urgent task than ever before.

The only way to resolve the North Korean issue is for the international community to work together for a peaceful resolution through dialogue in combination with increased economic sanctions.

In regard to this point, remarkably, U.S. Secretary of State Rex. W. Tillerson said in his statement on the latest North Korea’s missile launch, “Diplomatic options remain viable and open, for now. The United States remains committed to finding a peaceful path to denuclearization and to ending belligerent actions by North Korea.”

Former U.S. Secretary of Defense William J. Perry said, “[T]here ought to be a clear understanding on the part of Japanese leaders of what the consequence of failure of diplomacy is. In the absence of diplomacy and in the presence of reckless talk, we have created the conditions which make--which allow us to blunder into a war, a war which could turn nuclear and which would be very catastrophic,” and stressed that there is neither viable military options nor solutions other than diplomacy and dialogue (The Asahi Shimbun, November 29, 2017).

The Japanese government should seriously take these words of the former U.S. Defense Secretary who was prepared to take military action if necessary, but ultimately entered into direct talks between Washington and Pyongyang during the 1994 nuclear crisis on the Korean Peninsula.

The JCP strongly urges the Japanese government to change its attitude of turning its back on dialogue and supporting the possible use of military force, and to make diplomatic efforts for peaceful resolution through dialogue and negotiations.