Another forced labor victim accepts Korean compensation

Diplomacy

Published: 25 May. 2023, 18:54

Another forced labor victim accepts Korean compensation

A statue representing a forced labor victim in a park in Daejeon in this file photo dated March 6, when the Korean government announced its proposal to compensate the victims with Korean corporate donations. [KIM SEONG-TAE]

A Korean forced labor victim decided to take compensation from the Korean government and companies instead of waiting for the court process on a case she filed against Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.

"The compensation will be remitted to the surviving victim on Friday," said the Foreign Ministry in its statement on Thursday. "The government hopes that this solution will go towards healing the wounds of the victims and bereaved families."

The ministry withheld the name of the victim who decided to take the Korean compensation, at the request of her relatives.

There were 15 forced labor victims who sued Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Nippon Steel for compensation across the years from the 1990s to the 2010s.

The cases grew protracted as lower courts ruled against the plaintiffs, who would then appeal their cases.

Then came a landmark ruling on Oct. 30, 2018, when the Korean Supreme Court ordered Nippon Steel to pay 100 million won ($75,335) each to Korean victims of Japanese forced labor. The Supreme Court made a similar ruling on Nov. 29, 2018, against Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.

Japan protested the decision, claiming that all compensation issues related to its colonial rule were resolved with a treaty with Korea in 1965. In that deal, Japan gave Korea $300 million in economic aid and $500 million in loans.

Korea's top court acknowledged the illegality of Japan's 1919-45 colonial rule and recognized that individuals' rights to compensation had not expired.

Both Nippon Steel and Mitsubishi refused to comply with the top court's decisions, and the victims filed another case requesting the liquidation of assets of two Japanese companies to compensate forced labor victims.

Their cases were pending at the Supreme Court when the Korean government announced in March a proposed solution to these cases — compensation by a third party, namely, the Korean companies that benefitted from the Japanese aid and loans from the 1965 agreement.

Companies such as Posco pitched into the fund, and before Thursday, 10 out of 15 victims and relatives had opted to take on the Korean government's proposal.

Of the remaining five, three were surviving victims.

Around 220,000 Koreans were forced to work in Japan during Japan's occupation of Korea between 1910 and 1945, according to a fact-finding commission affiliated with the Prime Minister's office in Seoul. An estimate of 1,200 or so currently survives.

The Korean government's proposal on the forced labor issue has largely been criticized by liberal Democratic Party members and members of civic groups and victims' associations as a concession made by Korea without due returns from Japan.

In a summit meeting with President Yoon Suk Yeol in Tokyo in March, shortly after the Korean government made the announcement on compensating the victims, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida referred to the joint declaration of 1998 adopted by Korean President Kim Dae-jung and Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi but did not repeat the words of "deep remorse and heartfelt apology" mentioned in the statement.

In a follow-up summit in Seoul in May, Kishida said his "heart aches" for those who "experienced difficulties and sadness under a harsh environment," referring to Japan's 1910-45 colonial rule over Korea.

BY ESTHER CHUNG [chung.juhee@joongang.co.kr]