North holds forum on Japan’s colonial atrocities as Pyongyang nonresponsive to Tokyo’s summit request

Kim Yo-jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, attends a wreath-laying ceremony at Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum in Hanoi, Vietnam, on March 2, 2019. [AP/YONHAP]

 
North Korea held a forum on Wednesday condemning Japan’s colonial-era atrocities, signaling continued hostility as it ignores Tokyo’s request to hold a bilateral summit. 
 
The forum, hosted at the State Academy of Sciences in Pyongyang, featured a series of presentations denouncing Japan’s historical conduct during its 1910–45 colonial rule of Korea and “divulging the wrongdoing of Japan from the past, an inveterate enemy,” according to the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on Thursday.
 
 
Yoon Sin-young, director of the Korean History Institute at Kim Il Sung University, Kim Young-hee, deputy director of the Korean Central History Museum and researchers Jo Myung-chol and Jo Hee-seung from the Academy of Social Sciences were among the speakers.  
“The historical wounds that the inveterate enemy, imperial Japan, inflicted on our people will never heal even after the passage of time or hundreds of generations, and should be repaid with retaliation thousands of times greater,” one speaker said.
 
The event came after Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi formally requested a summit with Pyongyang following her inauguration on Oct. 21. Japan’s Kyodo News reported on Nov. 4 that North Korea has not responded to the request, citing a Japanese government official.
 
In March last year, Kim Yo-jong, vice department director of the North’s ruling Workers’ Party, said in March 2024 that North Korea “has clearly understood once again the attitude of Japan” and “will pay no attention to and reject any contact and negotiations with the Japanese side.”
 
Her remarks were widely interpreted as a response to reports that Japan sought to raise the issue of North Korean abductions of Japanese nationals during a future summit. 
 
In a separate statement released in February 2024, Kim claimed the abduction issue “has already been resolved.” Tokyo maintains that the matter remains unresolved.
 
The Japanese abductee issue involves North Korea’s abduction of Japanese citizens in the 1970s and 1980s to train spies. Pyongyang admitted to 13 cases in 2002 and allowed five to return, but Tokyo believes others remain alive and continues to demand a full account.

This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.
BY JEONG HYE-JEONG [[email protected]]