opinion

Japan tries to put the Sado Mine, a site for forced labour of Koreans, on the list of world cultural heritage.

“The project team for registering the gold mine on Sado Island as part of world heritage” led by the Liberal Democratic Party, the ruling party of Japan, is absorbed in securing the supporters for the purpose, while asking foreign embassies in Japan for cooperation.

The problem is that the Japanese authorities presented again the application for the registration of the mine as part of world cultural heritage rejected by UNESCO in February 2022.

The mine is associated with the deep-rooted grudge and souls of Koreans.

The Japanese imperialists, who occupied Korea by force of arms (1905-1945) in the last century, enforced the policy of exterminating the Korean nation and took a large number of Koreans to Japan to force them into slave labour for expanding its colonial war to the continent.

Many Koreans suffered all kinds of deadly grinding toil in the Sado Mine as well.

In the horrible environment in which they, stripped of even basic human rights, had to pass deadly crisis every moment while being worked harder than horses and oxen, many of them died a miserable death.

The Japanese imperialists’ barbarous exploitation of Koreans in the mine was disclosed by Koreans who narrowly escaped from it.

Nevertheless, the Japanese authorities are attempting to openly put the mine on the list of world cultural heritage. This is an insult to human civilization and expression of a cunning and tricky intention peculiar to Japan which tries to embellish its past crimes.

As is known, world cultural heritage include the geological and geographical objects of special value to humankind, major wild animal and plant distribution areas, important ecosystems as objects of study and areas of great anthropological and architectural significance.

Japan knows it but it is talking again about putting the mine on the list of world cultural heritage. This is really a shameless and cunning attempt, which arouses great indignation of the victimized countries and people that were subjected to untold misfortunes and pains in the past by the Japanese imperialists and of the international community aspiring to justice and truth.

Even if it removes the evidence of its past crimes and covers relevant objects with the cloak of cultural heritage, Japan will never be able to evade the responsibility for the crimes.

Japan’s move to put relevant objects on the list of world cultural heritage can never be tolerated and Japan should properly reflect on its past crimes, and apologize and compensate for them.