Haruki Wada, a professor emeritus at Tokyo University, said in his new book that Japan should immediately renounce its claims of sovereignty over Dokdo.

In his recently published book titled “How to Settle the Territorial Dispute in Northeast Asia,” the 75-year-old progressive scholar argued that Japan’s claim was immoral in light of Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula from 1910-1945. 

“It is hard to find morality in Japan’s assertion that Korea’s control of Dokdo is an ‘illegal occupation’ and the islets are their own territory while regretting the colonial rule,” he said.

In the preface for the Korean-language version, he criticized Japan for not carrying out “must-do” measures such as compensation and official apologies for its past atrocities, while stressing that both countries should come to the discussion table and try to resolve the issues through communication.

In the book, the historian strongly rejected Japan’s territorial claims across Northeast Asia, including the South Kuril Islands and Diaoyu Dao, the epicenters of diplomatic spats with Russia and China.

Wada insisted that Japan drop the claims for the sake of peaceful coexistence and mending bitter diplomatic ties.

“It is folly to continue an empty claim that worsens ties between Korea and Japan and among its citizens,” he said.

He suggested that mutual understanding from both sides will occur when Korea secures fishing rights for Shimane Prefecture fishermen and stops designating Dokdo as the starting point of its exclusive economic zone.

The author has published a number of history books on a range of Korean issues including “Kim Il Sung and the Manchurian Anti-Japanese War” (1993) and “A Complete History of the Korean War” (2002). Both titles were translated and published in Korea.

In 2012, Wada won the DMZ Peace Prize in recognition of his contribution to Korean Peninsular peace and normalization of ties between North Korea and Japan.

By Park Han-na (hnpark@heraldcorp.com)