KOREAN EMBASSY
36, CADOGAN SQUARE
LONDON, S . W . I .
YTK/TJ/RJ/C

28th July, 1959.

To: His Excellency Ile Foreign Minister.
From: Korean Embassy, London.
Subject: Mass Deportation of the Korean Residents in Japan to the Communist North
There is no indication here that the United Kingdom Government is considering to take any other position basically different from the one we have previously reported to the Foreign Ministry. It is felt that the Foreign Office still wishes to avoid any involvement in the present dispute between Korea and Japan.
It is reliably learned from the Foreign Office source that the Foreign Office had prepared a piece of paper for a possible talk with the Japanese Prime Minister Kishi of the subject matter during his recent visit to London, but it found the paper to be useless because no discussion took place at all when Mr. Kishi actually paid a visit. It is said that the meetings between the representative of the two Governments were devoted only to the discussion of the items which had been previously agreed and that the subject question was not placed on the agreed agenda.
With regard to the background information which you have given us in your Note No.1686 of 4th July, 1959, this Embassy issued a circular statement as of 24th July under the title of "Facts that must be known on the Japanese Mass deportation of the Korean residents in Japan to the Communist north." For your information a copy of the statement which we distributed among the Press, Diplomatic Missions,
Foreign Office, and personal friends is herein enclosed.
/ On
Information copy to:
His Excellency The President.
On 27th July, Counsellor Park, saw Mr. Trench, Assistant head of the Far Eastern Department of the Foreign Office in order to refresh him on the Korean position in the subject question according to the background information mentioned above. Mr. Trench said that he took note of the statement released by this Embassy but that he did not find anything particular in the report from the British Embassy in Tokyo which indicated any sign of progress being made for a settlement in the subject matter.
In regard to your cable KL - 0721 of 16th July, 1959, I personally wish to point out that as far as the mass in this country is concerned, they are rather unconcerned over the happenings in the Far East today, and that the popular newspaper in the United Kingdom have never dealt with the question of the Japanese mass deportation of the Korean residents in Japan to the Communist north.
As for the recent press comment, however, may I invite your attention to the fact that, in its issue of 18th July 1959, the Economist remarked with regard to
Kishi's tour to Europe as follows:-
The prime Minister's attempts to grapple with foreign policy - sometimes single-handed, sometimes in accord with his foreign minister, Mr. Fujiyama, and sometimes in conflict with Mr.Fujiyama - have not been very successful. Japan's current dealings with the two Koreas illustrate this. The bid to rid Japan of procommunist Koreans by dispatching them to North Korea seems doomed to failure by the understandable reluctance of the International Red Cross to be dragged into the business, especially on the terms being dictated by the North Koreans and apparently acquiesced in by the Japanese Red Cross. Meanwhile, South Korea has been still further estranged".

Respectfully,

Yu Taik Kim

Ambassador.