The latest move on the tangled chessboard of ties between Japan and South Korea has arrived, with Tokyo’s trade minister saying he would accept Seoul’s request for joint talks leading to arbitration by the World Trade Organisation (WTO). This follows Seoul’s complaint to the WTO two weeks ago regarding Tokyo’s move to tighten export controls. In July, Japan, citing unspecified “security reasons”, had imposed restrictions on key chemicals that South Korean companies like Samsung and LG use to produce semiconductors and displays. Last month, it removed South Korea from its list of trusted trade partners, and expanded stricter export controls to a wide range of materials that it says could be used to make weapons.

Tokyo says its decisions were in no way meant as retaliation or a “countermeasure” to the issue of former civilian workers from the Korean peninsula, but no one is convinced. It is plain to all that it is fuming that Seoul did not step in to block a series of adverse rulings in South Korean courts that seemed to ignore the hard-won 1965 settlement between the two nations under which Japan extended US$500 million in grants and loans – equivalent to 1.6 times of South Korea’s national budget at the time – to settle this historical issue “completely and finally”.