Lawyers representing four South Koreans, recently awarded damages by the country's top court for wartime labor, were rebuffed Monday when they visited a Japanese steel maker in Tokyo to demand it pay the compensation.
After a request to hold a meeting was rejected by Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp., Kim Se-un, one of the lawyers, told reporters that they will "start procedures to seize" the assets of the Japanese company's affiliates in South Korea as a way to secure damages.
The lawyers and supporters of the plaintiffs had planned to hand over a document calling on Nippon Steel to comply with the final ruling, which was issued Oct. 30. The South Korean top court ordered the company to pay a total of 400 million won ($350,000) to the four victims who were forced to work during Japan's 1910-1945 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.