Dok-do Stamp to be Issued as Scheduled

As Japan has required the “reappraisal of Dok-do stamp issue” which has stirred a conflict between the two countries, the postal administration announced on January 8 that it will begin selling four kinds of stamps, “Nature of Dok-do” from January 16 as previously scheduled.

The stamps, “Nature of Dok-do” laid out by the postal administration on this day are made up of stamps decked out with the pink-colored “Getmeh” flower which blooms in May and June, soft violet-colored “Wangheguk” flower which blooms in September, “Seumsae,” a marine fowl which migrates to the southern Pacific region in autumn, and “Gwaeng-I” sea gull, a resident bird of Korea which visits Dok-do island every May. Each stamp costs 190 won, and the number to be printed will be 560,000 respectively for each design, and a total of 2.24 million pieces.

“The territory in controversy, ‘Dok-do’ can be seen as a Korean land,” remarked the Japanese government as to this stamp, adding, “Korea continuously carries out unfair controversial measures on this territory such as setting up a post box and specifying a postal code.” Japan has raised an objection to the Korean foreign ministry, sending the first secretary at the Japanese embassy in Seoul, twice last August and September.

In September 2003, the chief of state affairs at the Japanese embassy in Korea visited the chief of Asia-Pacific department of foreign ministry and required the reappraisal of Dok-do stamp issue again. On the same day, the ministry of government administration in Japan sent a letter to the chief of Korean postal administration, asserting, “The subject and the design of the relevant stamps violate the agreement of the Universal Postal Union.”

“The English edition of Stamp Review magazine, which is brought out and distributed by the Korean postal administration periodically, introduced the ‘2004 Stamp Issuing Plan’ in July 2003. Japan may have known about the Dok-do stamp depicted on this book,” remarked the postal administration, adding, “Issuing stamps is a basic right of a sovereign country. The Dok-do stamp doesn’t violate UPU agreement so we are continuing with the schedule.” No stamp issuing has been cancelled by the other country’s pressure.

gustav@donga.com