New Personal Agenda

Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, took on another personal agenda, abduction issue. In a gaggle with correspondents at Official Residence of Prime Minister on Thursday evening, Abe announced that Japan and North Korea had agreed with resuming investigation of Japanese abductees in North Korea. For its compensation, Japan would lift its economic sanction against the North. So, who is going to be the winner of this deal?

The deal was something comprehensive. Not only abductees, all Japanese in the North are subjected to the research. The government of Japan had listed twelve abductees in North Korea, eight of which the North explained to have been dead and the rest not to have immigrated at all. Other than those people, Japan had registered about four hundred seventy people as specific missing citizens, possibly abducted by the North. The North’s research includes on Japanese spouses of North Korean citizens and other Japanese, which amount to over three thousand.

Abduction issue was a springboard of Abe’s political carrier. He was one of a few lawmakers who argued to take the abductees back to Japan in 1990s, when most people did not believe in such a conspiracy. After he made a case as Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary for Prime Minister Jun-ichiro Koizumi and supported summit meeting of the two nations that led to returning five abductees to Japan, Abe stepped up as a new leader in Japanese politics. “My duty will not finish until all families of abductees embrace their children in their arms,” Abe insisted to the reporters in the gaggle.

It is unclear, however, whether the North will make sufficient investigation on it. It reported fake evidence on the abductees or did nothing for the agreement of research in the past. According to new agreement, Japan will lift its sanction policy on immigration or port entry of North Korean vessels for humanitarian purpose. While Japan has been taking hardest measures against the North, it will be the first nation which shows softer attitude to the country with development of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.

United States, the leader of international concerted efforts to get rid of North’s threats, is worried about benefitting Kim Jong-un administration without substantial progress. Given a lesson that Koizumi visited Pyongyang for the deal in abduction issue without realizing the nuclear program in the North, U.S. is closely watching the process of negotiation between Japan and North Korea. But one thing is obvious. It is unlikely for the North to give up its weapons program for compensation with the trade only with Japan.