Japan Decides to Freeze Humanitarian Aid to NK

The Japanese government held a special board of executive secretaries under the Cabinet meeting for NK-Japan normalization issue on Wednesday and decided to freeze humanitarian aid, including food aid, to NK for some time being.

The special board of executive secretaries, composed of various branches concerning NK, decided on the matters of: demanding NK to explain the punishments imposed on the North Koreans responsible for the kidnappings; strict enforcement of current standing policies such as ship inspection; and concluding the measures for six clauses and inspecting the “harsh measures” in case of no convincing acts from NK.

Senior Vice Minister for Foreign Affair Seiken Sugiura said, “Unless the kidnapping issue is solved, normalization can’t be accomplished. During the conference, the issue of economic sanctions was not mentioned, but economic sanctions is included under ‘harsh measures.’”

Won-Jae Park parkwj@donga.com