A South Korean scholar called on President Park Geun-hye to take on a broader leadership role for East Asian peace rather than focusing on peninsular security, stressing the need for her to lead the country’s ties with Japan in a direction that promotes regional stability.

Nam Ki-jeong, a professor at the Institute for Japanese Studies in Seoul National University, said the improved Seoul-Tokyo ties would create leverage to enhance the ties between the two Koreas and between Pyongyang and Tokyo, and help entrench peace in East Asia. He called the three bilateral relationships a “core triangle of regional peace.”

“President Park needs to pursue a leadership role for East Asian peace beyond the security of the Korean Peninsula, and from this perspective, she needs to approach Korea-Japan relations,” he told The Korea Herald.

“Park can also play a role in leading Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to shake off his image as a symbol of nationalism and pursue an image of fostering peace in the region.”

Pursuing broader regional peace is in line with her administration’s policy drive aimed at building multilateral trust to address the “Asia Paradox,” in which regional political and security cooperation is weak, despite deepening socioeconomic interdependence, Nam added.

Touching on the tumultuous history of bilateral negotiations to address conflicts concerning Japan’s 1910-45 colonization of the peninsula, Nam said Seoul and Tokyo had carried out an “unprecedented undertaking” given that no other former colonizers and colonies in the world have engaged in tough negotiations to settle colonial-era issues since the end of World War II.

Although from Korea’s perspective, the outcomes from the bilateral negotiations may be far from satisfactory, the process itself has been meaningful given that it could set a “historical model” for those who have yet to settle their own issues, the professor pointed out.

“Yes, Germany has squarely faced its history, but what it strived to settle was not about colonial-era atrocities or damages, but about the Nazi Holocaust during World War II. Few in world history have dealt with compensation issues related to colonial occupations,” he said

“Korea and Japan live in close proximity, and thus they have had to confront their issues. But former European colonizers live far away from their onetime colonies in Africa and Asia, and they have left their issues still unresolved or unattended.”

Mentioning the future role of the Korea-Japan cooperation, Nam raised the possibility that their partnership could evolve to take on a “role as a public good” to tackle regional challenges, just as the alliances between Korea and the U.S., and between the U.S. and Japan have done.

“To add the moral dimension to the Korea-Japan relations, the relationship could help promote stability in the region, particularly when a contradictory mix of cooperation and competition between the U.S. and China is injecting complexities into the regional order,” he said.

“Under these circumstances, the Korea-Japan relationship can help stabilize the Sino-U.S. relationship through cooperative ties among Korea, China and Japan, and among Korea, the U.S. and Japan.”

Criticizing the absence of a bilateral summit, the scholar said Park should use her talks with Abe to ratchet up pressure on him over history issues and draw media attention in Japan, which will move Japan’s civil society and anti-Abe forces to create more pressure on him.

“Look at what has transpired over the last two years, during which South Korea has not made sufficient diplomatic efforts. Tokyo seems to be trying to do as it pleases in an unbridled manner, and Korea has no leverage to rein that in,” he said.

“President Park should raise the issue of Japan’s wartime sexual slavery directly. Whether he would accept it or not, the direct demand by a South Korean leader would press him and put Park in a diplomatically advantageous position.”

Seoul has so far maintained that should a summit be held when “conditions” are not ripe, it could only be a venue for reaffirming the two sides’ differences and eventually turn out to be “counterproductive.”

To boost bilateral cooperation and create a future-oriented partnership, Nam suggested that the two sides create a list of shared threats or challenges for which they should coordinate joint responses.

“The two sides can promote mutual interests through joint responses to various challenges including transnational diseases such as the Middle East respiratory syndrome that has hit Korea,” he said.

“They can also work together to tackle the issue of nuclear safety or create a new cooperative framework among Korean and Japanese companies to constantly foster common interests.”

By Song Sang-ho (sshluck@heraldcorp.com)