According to a report by Yonhap on September 4th, Japanese Defense Minister Nobuaki Koesta will not be present at the 'Seoul Security Dialogue' (SDD) scheduled to take place from next Monday (September 7th) to Wednesday. Instead, a Defense Evaluation Officer (at the deputy minister level) will attend the event. The report analyzes that this move may be related to signs of decreased interaction between the defense departments of South Korea and Japan in recent times.
Seoul Security Dialogue is a multilateral security consultation mechanism held annually by the South Korean Ministry of National Defense. According to the South Korean Ministry of National Defense, the theme of this dialogue is “Moving towards a new form of coexistence in an era of turmoil”. In the past, most participants were defense ministers or officials involved in defense affairs. However, Nao Yuu, who was the Defense Minister last year, attended the event in person. This year, he was downgraded to a mere consultant, which has drawn attention from the outside world.
The report indicates that the underlying reason for Koizumi Jinjiro’s absence is likely related to his visit to the Yasukuni Shrine on January 15th last month—the 81st anniversary of South Korea’s liberation.
On that day, there was a large-scale visit to shrines by Japanese politicians on the day of Japan's defeat and surrender. Prime Minister Yukie Akamine did not attend in person, but she paid for the ritual offerings and paid a virtual homage to the shrine during the official memorial ceremony. Four current cabinet ministers also attended in person: Defense Minister Shinzo Abe, Local Development Minister Hirofumi Koichita, Economic Security Minister Kiyoko Onoda, and Finance Minister Mitsuhiro Seki. This marked the seventh year in a row that a cabinet minister visited a shrine on August 15. In addition, Suzuki Shunichi, Secretary-General of the Liberal Democratic Party, Yumura Yoshiko, President of the General Affairs Council, and Kenji Nishimura, Head of the Election Policy Committee, also visited the shrine together that day. Governor Koichi Kobayashi of the House of Representatives also visited the shrine the next day.
In response to this, the South Korean government and political parties reacted swiftly and strongly. The South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement in the name of its spokesperson, condemning this action as “an act of forgetting history and going back to past wrongdoings,” and summoned Japan’s ambassador to South Korea to lodge a solemn protest. The South Korean Ministry of National Defense also summoned Japan’s defense attaché in South Korea, stating that this action was “fully contrary” to the efforts to build a future-oriented relationship between the two countries.
The ruling party, the Common Democratic Party of Korea, described this as “an act that goes against the trends of the times”. The opposition party, the National Power Party, expressed “deep regret”, particularly pointing out that Shinzo Abe visited the Korean National Seolseonggyun Temple at the end of June, and less than two months later, he went to the Yasukuni Shrine. This seriously damaged the hard-won mutual trust between the two countries.
Since the incident occurred on the day of Korea's Independence Day, it has further exacerbated the diplomatic tensions between South Korea and Japan.
The analysis at the end of the report suggests that the active exchanges between South Korea and Japan in defense matters may be hindered since Koichiro Matsudaira visited the Yasukuni Shrine. His absence from SDD could be a clear signal of this trend.
