SEOUL (Kyodo) The incoming South Korean consul general in Hiroshima is the son of a man who experienced the 1945 atomic bomb attack on the city and took the lead in a campaign to win Japanese compensation for South Korean victims until his death in 1999, it was learned Saturday.
"It feels like my late father is telling me, 'You should serve the cause of peace,' " Shin Hyong Gun, 57, said.
"Hiroshima is the place where my father dedicated his whole life to the deepening of South Korea-Japan relations. It is my pleasure to be able to work there," he said. "I would like to abide by his wishes and work on expanding peaceful ties."
Shin is currently consul general in Shenyang, China, and is slated to take up his new post in March. It will be his first long-term assignment in Japan.
His father, Shin Yong Su, was forced to work in a military drug company in Hiroshima in 1942.