Fewer Japanese Admire Korea: Poll

It was reported that 57.1 percent of the Japanese consider Japan’s relationship with Korea “is not good,” the highest figure ever recorded. This is a result of a survey on diplomatic relationships released by Japanese Cabinet Office on December 9.

In the survey, 48.5 percent of the Japanese said that they had friendly feelings toward Korea, a 2.6 percent decrease compared to the last year’s poll, which is indicative of the fact that affinity the Japanese felt for Korea since 2002, thanks to the Korea-Japan World Cup and the Korean Wave, is vanishing.

The survey asked 3,000 Japanese adults nationwide from October 5 to 15 and got answers from 1,704 (56.8 percent).

According to the survey, the rate of people who replied that the two countries don’t have a good relationship exceeded 54.9 percent (1996), which was the highest since 1986 when the survey started. On the other hand, only 34.4 percent of the surveyed answered the relationship between the two countries is fine, the lowest figure ever recorded.

The Japanese media analyzed that visits to the Yasukuni Shrine by former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and a standoff between the two countries over maritime surveys near the Dokdo islets negatively affected favorable impressions the Japanese had on Korea.

However, Japan’s Asahi Shimbun reported that the lowest favorable rating among the Japanese toward Korea was only a temporary blip since Prime Minister Shinzo Abe made a visit to Korea during the survey.

Meanwhile, regarding the China-Japan relationship, the rate of people who said the two countries’ relationship was good had dropped by 27 percent for two years starting 2003. This time however, 21.7 percent of those surveyed replied that the two countries have a good relationship, a two percent increase compared to last year. In addition, 34.3 percent of the polled said they have a friendly feeling toward China, a 1.9 percent increase compared to last year.

sya@donga.com