Japan Press Weekly

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2015 July 8 - 14 [SOCIAL ISSUES]

Japan’s new World Heritage sites attract unexpected international attention to its era of colonialism

Akahata ‘current’ column

The UNESCO World Heritage Committee in its latest session approved a document which awards world heritage status to sites important to Japan’s industrial revolution between the late 19th and the early 20th centuries. The committee, however, in a footnote appended to the document stated that the committee will pay attention to Japan’s remarks in the session.

The South Korean government is pointing out that a large number of Koreans were engaged in forced labor at seven sites of the newly-listed sites in Japan, such as the Yawata Steel Works in southern Japan. In an address delivered after the committee’s approval, a representative of the Japanese government admitted that many Korean people were brought to Japan against their will and were “forced” to work under harsh working conditions. Japan also expressed its intention to set up an information center to preserve the memory of these facts.

It was Germany, the chair of the World Heritage Committee, that proposed adding the footnote to the document. Germany, an aggressor nation during World War II, requested its aggressor ally during WWII Japan to face up to the past, however unpleasant.

The Japanese government initially argued that the sites in question have nothing to do with its colonial rule on the grounds that the country had undergone the industrial revolution before it colonized the Korean Peninsula in 1910.This argument, however, does not carry much weight from a historical point of view.

Before entering the 1910s, Japan promoted industrialization as part of its effort to increase national wealth and military strength. The Japanese government in 1875 made Korea open its door to Japan using military threat and waged wars with China (1894-95) and with Russia (1904-05) over control of the Korean Peninsula. As shown by these facts alone, Japan was working to colonize the peninsula while pushing forward with its industrial revolution.

A UNESCO advisory panel, which conducted screening of candidates for the World Heritage list, requires Japan to draw up a plan to foster understanding of the history associated with each site by December 2017. The listing of the sites means that the international community is encouraging Japan to honestly reflect on its past.