The leaders of Japan and North Korea, countries with long-standing, unresolved and intractable issues, have not met for 20 years. This diplomatic inertia must not continue.

Both sides should revitalize their efforts to resume dialogue for the sake of peace and stability in East Asia.

Former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi last visited North Korea in 2004 and met with the secluded country’s supreme leader, Kim Jong Il. It was Koizumi’s second and final trip to Pyongyang.

Since then, however, no summit between Japanese and North Korean leaders has materialized, and the diplomatic rupture between the two countries, which once aimed to normalize diplomatic relations with the 2002 Pyongyang Declaration signed by Koizumi and Kim, has only deepened.

The blame for this corrosive stalemate lies with North Korea, which has kept ramping up its nuclear and missile development and not responded sincerely to the issue of its abductions of Japanese citizens decades ago.

The families of the abduction victims are getting........

© The Asahi Shimbun