North Korea slams Japan over abduction issue as victims' families urge Tokyo to 'bargain for their freedom'

North Korea has rejected Japan's offer to discuss the fate of Japanese nationals abducted by Pyongyang's agents in the 1970s and 1980s, insisting the issue has been resolved, while the families of the missing urge Tokyo "to bargain for their freedom".

In a commentary published by the state-run Korea Central News Agency, a researcher at the North Korean foreign ministry's Institute for Japan Studies said the abduction issue had been settled "completely, finally and irreversibly".

In the article, Ri Pyong-dok criticised Japan for raising the abductions and North Korea's broader human rights abuses at the United Nations, saying Tokyo needed to start apologising for its own past historical injustices and its brutal rule on the Korean peninsula from 1910 to 1945.

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In Tokyo, however, groups supporting families of people who have been abducted and academics specialising in relations with North Korea say they are far from dissuaded by the government official's comments. It is, they say, all part of the complicated diplomatic dance the parties must engage in, and once the rhetoric has died down there is a chance for one-on-one talks between the nations.

Pyongyang's comments in state media on Wednesday come almost exactly one month after Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida spoke to the families of the abductees. During that meeting, Kishida said he remained committed to senior-level negotiations with North Korea that could lead to a summit with leader Kim Jong-un and the return of 12 Japanese officially listed as having been abducted by the North.

The National Police Agency, however, has 872 names on its list of missing Japanese who may have been kidnapped by the North.

Most victims were apprehended by North Korean agents who had landed in inflatable boats on remote beaches in northern Japan. They were then forced aboard ships disguised as trawlers and taken back to the North to train Pyongyang's agents in the Japanese language and customs before they were infiltrated into Japan.

North Korea is also believed to have abducted hundreds of South Koreans, as well as a handful of Europeans and people from Southeast Asia.

To defuse the situation, Kishida said he was willing to meet Kim "at the earliest opportunity" and that any such summit would "be to the benefit of both sides, and be an enormous contribution to regional stability and peace".

If the nations' leaders meet, it would be the first since Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi met Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang in 2002 and secured the release of five Japanese nationals.

At that time, Kim Jong-il admitted that a further 12 Japanese had been taken to North Korea but claimed they all died of illness or in accidents. The abductees' families say they cannot accept that claim without evidence, as long as there have been occasional reports of Japanese being seen in the North.

Similarly, Kaoru Hasuike, who was abducted in 1978 and spent 24 years in the North, said last year that he could not publicly tell his full story as it could endanger those Japanese who had yet to be released.

If those reports are accurate, then Kishida's initiative could bear fruit.

"This reply from the North does not come as a surprise, but it is interesting that it is not from a senior government official," said Toshimitsu Shigemura, a professor at Tokyo's Waseda University and an authority on North Korea's leadership.

Because the North was in dire need of humanitarian aid and for sanctions to be lifted, this diplomatic move showed beneath the surface that Pyongyang was ready for talks, Shigemura told This Week in Asia.

Previous Japanese governments placed the abductions at the top of the agenda for any discussions with North Korea, he pointed out, but Kishida appeared willing to put humanitarian aid and other concessions above the abductees. This could be sufficient to convince Pyongyang to open talks, he suggested.

"There has also been a change in the attitude of the families and their supporters," Shigemura said.

After years of calling for sanctions and pressure having no effect, families desperate to see their loved ones are now "ready for Japan to bargain for their freedom", he added.

Yuki Yakabe, a director of The Investigating Commission on Missing Japanese Probably Related to North Korea, said the families still had hope as they waited for a briefing from the Japanese government on the latest comments from Pyongyang.

"The families of the victims really want to have them back or, if they really are dead, then to have that confirmed and to have their remains so they can at least have a memorial ceremony for them," she said.

"The families are ready for the government to negotiate now," she said, but admitted that Pyongyang's actions in the past meant there was a deep-seated lack of trust.

Shigemura said "a breakthrough is needed", because time was running out and there were credible reports of abductees still living in the North.

This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (SCMP).

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