Korea backs call to provide info on forced labor at Unesco site

Diplomacy

Published: 18 Sep. 2023, 19:07 Updated: 18 Sep. 2023, 19:09

Korea backs call to provide info on forced labor at Unesco site

Decaying concrete structures on Hashima Island, one of the Unesco World Heritage sites connected with Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution enlisted in 2015. This file photo is dated Oct. 10, 2020. [YONHAP]

Korea echoed on Monday the World Heritage Committee’s recent statement calling on Japan to follow up on its promises regarding a Unesco World Heritage site in Japan where Koreans engaged in forced labor.

“We recognize that Japan took some measures since the previous committee statement,” a Foreign Ministry official told reporters in Seoul on Monday. “But we stand by the committee’s recent statement encouraging Japan to continue dialogue with concerned parties, as well as to conduct further research and verification, including on testimonies.”

The official was referring to a statement issued by the World Heritage Committee last Thursday, which urged Japan to continue to engage with concerned parties, including Korea, to try to ensure visitors to the sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution, inscribed by Unesco since 2015, are informed of their full history.

The statement also acknowledged that Japan took new steps in this direction, and called on it to continue such work, possibly by incorporating "new testimonies" of relevant parties. It asked Japan to submit a report to the committee on its efforts by December 2024.

The Meiji sites include Hashima Island, where as many as 800 Korean forced laborers worked during the Pacific War between 1943 and 1945.

Korea protested strongly when Japan moved in 2013 to enlist the site on Unesco, and Unesco recommended Japan take proper measures to ensure visitors to the sites are informed of their full history.

Japan in turn had pledged to take measures to "allow an understanding that there were a large number of Koreans and others who were brought against their will and forced to work under harsh conditions in the 1940s at some of the sites," according to the committee.

By July 2021, however, such measures were found lacking, and Unesco criticized Japan for not keeping its promise. It gave Japan the deadline of Dec. 1, 2022, to address the "insufficient" information available about the history of forced labor on Hashima Island.

"The information center (IHIC) has been established since 2020, and although it contains a variety of research material relating to the lives of workers, including oral testimonies, the mission has concluded that, to date, there is no display that could be characterized as adequately serving the purpose of remembering the victims," reads a report released by Unesco at the time.

The latest committee statement last week followed Japan’s report submitted to the committee last December. In its report, Japan pledged to continue its efforts but also argued that the Koreans forced to work on Hashima were not necessarily subject to conditions worse than those experienced by other workers of other nationalities.

The new measures taken by Japan acknowledged by the committee include Japan establishing a new victims' memorial space at the Industrial Heritage Information Center in Tokyo that displays materials related to workers who died in Hashima, including Koreans.

Tunnels inside the Sado mine, being pushed by Japan for listing as a Unesco World Heritage site. This file photo is dated Dec. 27, 2021. [YONHAP]

The Japanese government has also been pushing for enlistment as a Unesco World Heritage site the Sado mine, another location in the country with a history of forced labor, much to Korea’s protest.

“We hope that Japan will first take measures to show the full history of the sites related to the Meiji Industrial Revolution, before it tries to enlist another location,” said the Foreign Ministry official.

Over 1,000 Koreans were forced to work at the mine during World War II, which took place during the Japanese occupation of Korea (1910-1945).

The mine, primarily a gold mine during the Edo period (1603-1867), was used mainly for mining copper, zinc and iron during World War II.

It was shut down completely in 1989.

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