PM Abe’s Policy Speech Describes ROK As Only Sharing Strategic Interests With Japan

It seems like there is some bitterness in Japan over the backtracking in the ROK over the recent comfort women deal:

In this year’s policy speech, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe described South Korea as Japan’s “most important neighbor that shares our strategic interests.” Just like last year, though, he omitted “fundamental values” from this sentence.“At the end of last year, Japan and South Korea brought to an end a long-standing issue with our final and irreversible settlement on the issue of the comfort women,” Abe said during the speech, which he delivered to a joint session of the Diet, Japan’s parliament, on Jan. 22. “Since South Korea is our most important neighbor that shares our strategic interests, we will build a cooperative relationship for a new era in order to ensure peace and stability in East Asia.”  […………]

Abe’s decision to describe South Korea as a country that only shares “strategic interests” and not “fundamental values” appears to reflect unpleasant feelings that still remain even after the Dec. 28 settlement of the comfort women issue. In other words, Abe views South Korea not as a friend that shares values but as just a business partner that he must work with in regard to the issues of China’s rise and North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missile programs.  [Hankyoreh]

You can read the rest at the link.