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South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi held two-hour meeting at South Korean famous holiday resort Jeju Island on Wednesday.
The two leaders discussed a host of serious issues, among which the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula is the prominent one.
Wednesday's meeting came one month after the third round six-party nuclear talks, which were widely seen as having made tangible progress in dealing with the nuclear issue.
South Korea and Japan are members of the six parties, the other four are China, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), the US and Russia.
In order to persuade the DPRK to dismantle its nuclear program, Roh said his country will push ahead with a comprehensive and concrete inter-Korean economic cooperation project, while Koizumi expressed his hope Japan will normalize its relations with the DPRK "possibly within a year."
But these "rewards" only can be given after the DPRK makes decision to scrap its nuclear plan. As for Japan, the "Pyongyang's missile programs and kidnapping of Japanese citizens" are also important prerequisite for these "rewards."
Koizumi underscored "complete dismantlement of DPRK's nuclear weapons programs" is the common goal of South Korea and Japan in news conference.
Koizumi visited Pyongyang in this May and held talks with DPRK top leader Kim Jong Il mainly on the Japanese abductees and the nuclear issues.
Reversed from its former stance, Koizumi promised to give the DPRK massive economic aid in return for bringing back several relatives of the kidnapping victims, who already had gone back to Japan after Koizumi's 2002 Pyongyang visit.
Previously, Washington and Tokyo refused to give Pyongyang any economic aids unless the latter accepted the "complete, verifiable and irreversible" dismantlement of its nuclear weapons programs.
US, Japan and South Korea coordinated their joint strategies over the nuclear issue before the every opening of six-party talks.
Seoul-Tokyo summit came after US National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice's South Korea visit, during which she said the US would provide a "surprising reward" to the DPRK once it abandons its nuclear ambitions.
Roh and Koizumi also discussed issues related to bilateral relations as South Korea and Japan will mark the 40 anniversary of establishing formal diplomatic ties.
The Japanese premier said in the conference his government has decided to exempt South Koreans from entry visas for the World Exposition in Aichi from March to September next year and will consider a permanent waiver system to facilitate exchanges between the two neighbors.
As for the diplomatic row over Japan's justification of its colonization of the Korean Peninsula between 1910 and 1945, Roh said he will not raise the thorny issue during his tenure, which expires in early 2008.
The row stems primarily from the Japanese government's authorization of some middle and high school history textbooks which exclude the Japanese military's wartime exploitation of Korean women as "sex slaves," and whitewash Japan's colonial rule of Korea Peninsula.
"The reason is because I don't think it's desirable for the (South Korean) government to force it," Roh said, hoping the enhancement of exchanges by the peoples of the two neighbors will help resolve the history issue.
Roh also said he agreed with Koizumi that the two governments will make efforts to sign a high-level bilateral Free Trade Agreement by the end of next year to help consolidate economic cooperation in Northeast Asia.
(Xinhua News Agency July 22, 2004)
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