February 17, /959

Dear Sir:
Your editorial of February 14 concarning "Koreans in Japan" makes three excellent points; and it also raises some other questions chat deserve close attention
As you say, it to that the Japanese Government has chosen this there to raise the mission of sending some
thousands of our Korean nationals, who are resident in Japan, to the northern part of Korea which is under communist domination. After the years-end recess, the bilateral talks between our two Governments were about to be resumed, Then Japan injected this red herring issue, as though deliberately seeking to make agreement on our problems impossible,
zAs you also point cut, it would be impossible for our Government to accede to a deliberate Japanese plan to stronthen
the manpower resource of the communist authorities in north Korea, a regime with which we are still at war -- and a regime that in absolute violation of our rights and of United Nations policy forcibly occupies half our nation, It is equally impossible for us to acquiesce in this Japanese procedure of granting to the north Korean communist regime a de facto recognition that it is apparently (and happily) unwilling to grant openly.
Finally, as you rightly indicate, the Korean nationals in Japan who are alleged to want to return to communist north Korea have been victimized by lying promises of benefits and
by propaganda pressures. It is our duty to protect them against this campaign of deceit, and we are trying to do so.
When you mention the 800,000 Korean nationals in Japan (which is probably too high a figure) you might also note that they are there by duress having been taken to Japan before and during the Japanese war of aggression against China,
America, and them allies, as a labor▣ Now, impoverished and faced by legal and social discrimination, they are as a group denied the opportunity to earn a fair living. We have taken more than million of them back, since 1945, and have absorbed them into our econocmy Japan should not be allowed to avoid her responsibility to give those now in Japan a fair opportunity to earn a docent living.
Your editorial refers to still other matters in dispute between the Republic of Korea and Japan. Each of these questions is a complicated one. When Japan surrendered in 1945, our Korean life insurance companies had their headquarters (and resources) in Japan. Korean mony reserved in savings banks was in Japan. Koreans who had labored to Japan remain unpaid. These are debts that must be accounted for.
The point is that we Koreans do want to achieve a settlement. President Rhee has several times travelled to Japan to press this point. Negotiations broke down once before when Japan angrily claimed that, after all, Korea still belonged to her and 80% of our property belongs to Japanese.
Now negotiations are being broken off again by a Japanese threat to seat our Korean people into communist north Korea.
You indicate that it is American interest to avoid a clash between Korea and Japan. No clash will occur if Japan does not try to ship our people into communist slavery in northern part of Korea. We hope she will turn back from an action at once so rash and so unreasonable. More than this, we hope that a spirit of neighborliness will gradually arise in Japan, so that our long outstanding problems can be justly solved.

Sincerely yours,

Pyo Wook Han

Editor, Washington Post and Times-Herald 1515 L Street, N. W.
Washington, D. C.