STATEMENT

The Japanese Government has recently proposed to the Government of the Republic of Korea to repatriate the invalids among the nationals of one of the two countries interned or detained by the other. In this connection, the Korean Government does not see any necessity of bringing up this matter belatedly for discussion at the time when the negotiation for a settlement of the question of mutual release of the detainees and for arrangements on the resumption of formal Korea -Japan Conference is under way between the two countries, for Korea has consistently pursued a policy of repatriating, when necessary irrespective of any agreement, invalid Japanese fishermen to their families as early as practicable.
This being the case, the Korean Government can not but regard the proposal of the Japanese Government as a mere gesture to conceal, being afraid of international reproach, its undeniable atrocities upon the Korean detainees and to conveniently cover its insincerity in settling the issues pending between the two countries.
Under this circumstances, it will be worth retrospecting how the Japanese Government has revealed time and again its priori proclivity of breaking its pledge for its own advantages.
The Japanese Government has been detaining several hundreds of innocent Korean residents in its camps without any charge, trial, or due process of law. There am authenticated cases of extreme harshness on the part of Japan towards the detainees. Accomodations and conditions of the camps, particularly in food, medicine, hospitalization, and sanitation, have been found to be miserable and intolerable. This maltreatment by the Japanese Government has caused at least eight deaths of the Korean detainees and,moreover, is quite reminiscent of those in the notorious Japanese "death camps* and Nazi's "concentration camps" during the World War II period and in the Russian "slave camps" of present days.
This brutality has brought about the spontaneous uprisings of Korean detainees several times after long patience, demanding that the conditions of the camps, including the treatment of the detainees, be improved without further delay. However, the Japanese Government not only refused to consider the most reasonable request by the detainees in accordance with their basic human reight, but also resorted to force in oppressing the petitioners. Thus, the Korean Government on its own part lodged resolute protests with the Japanese Government against such maltreatment of Korean detainees by Japanese officials and overtured many times veracious measures to settle the untoward issue of detainees. The negotiation for reciprocal release were all but successful in November 1955 when Korean Minister Yong Shick Kim in Tokyo and Japanese Justice Minister Hanamura agreed on the settlement of the issue. But this was not materialized only because of the Japanese Government 's treacherous disavowal of the agreement. Later, in April 1956, another agreement was made between Minister Kim and Japanese Foreign Minister Shigemitsu ; however, Japan again demonstrated inveterate propencity for breaking its international obligation.
As a good contrast to this coarse treatment of the detainees and the changeable attitude of Japanese Government, the Korean Government has paid a due attention to those Japanese fishermen under detention in Pusan Aliens Camp on the charge of violating Korean laws governing fishery resources conservation and ,furthermore, it has returned, short of agreement, those invalid Japanese fishermen purely on humanitarian point of view, and also made every possible effort to faithfully filfill its own promise.
Yet the Japanese Government has sought to make deceptive propaganda on the treatment of Japanese fishermen by the Korean authorities. However, this absurd and fabricated stories were soon proved to be entirely groundless by a team of International Red Cross, which inspected both Pusan and Omura camps and reported that the conditions at Korean camp was adequate and acceptable under international standard, while these at the Japanese camps were deplorable and disgrace to a supposedly civilized country.
Korea stands fully, as it has always been, willing to release Japanese fishermen under detention in Korea whenever Japanese side shows it sincerity in settling the problems now under discussion at the preliminary meetings between the representatives of the two countries. Nevertheless, it must be noted, in this conjuncture, that although the mutual release of the detainees is, of course, an important problem to be settled urgently, the release must simultaneously be effectuated with the laying down of the principles upon which the formal Conference, if resumed, will proceed, considering that, had the basic principles been established with the divergence of opinions ironed out between the two nations, the detainees' problem and the "repatriation of the invalids" would never have remaind.
In view of the above consideration, the Government of the Republic of Korea reiterates that Korea is not anti-Japanese ; rather, it likes to normalize its relations with Japan - based on mutual respect and understanding, and also that the sincerity on the part of Japan is the only key to the cultivation of friendly and cooperative relations between the two countries - the Republic of Korea and Japan.