Japan Press Weekly

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2013 August 14 - 20 [JCP]

JCP Kasai attends ceremony marking Korean liberation from Japan’s colonization

Japanese Communist Party Lower House member Kasai Akira attended a “return of the light (Gwangbokjeol)” ceremony in Tokyo on August 15, celebrating the 68th anniversary of the liberation of the Korean Peninsula from Japanese colonization.

This was hosted by the Central Headquarter of the Korean Residents Union in Japan (Mindan).

Kasai stressed that the true friendship between Japanese and South Korean citizens will be established only when the Japanese government clears up issues arising from its past colonization.

Amid the growing international concern over the Japanese leadership’s drift to the right, rational criticism against the move to the right has increased among the Japanese public as shown by the JCP’s advance in the House of Councilors election in July, Kasai pointed out.

Concerning the wartime sex slave issue, he stated that the Japanese government should immediately and sincerely hold talks with the South Korean government based on the bilateral Agreement on the Settlement of Problems Concerning Property and Claims on Economic Co-operation.

The JCP representative also demanded that the Japanese government utilize the war-renouncing Article 9 and take the lead in promoting a policy of peaceful diplomacy in order to achieve the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and establish a peaceful environment in Northeast Asia.

Kasai also raised the need to swiftly provide local suffrage for permanent foreign residents in Japan.