South Korean President Lee Jae Myung said that agreements over contentious historical issues reached with Japan by prior administrations “cannot be overturned,” in an interview published Saturday in several Japanese media outlets, just hours before he was due to meet Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba.
Earlier Saturday, Lee became the first South Korean president to visit Japan — his country’s former colonial master — before traveling to the United States, the two Asian nations’ mutual ally. South Korean leaders have traditionally made the U.S. their first overseas destination.
Lee’s visit to Tokyo is expected to be rich in symbolism, coming on the 80th anniversary of the end of imperial Japan’s brutal 1910-45 rule of the Korean Peninsula and the 60th anniversary of the neighbors’ establishment of diplomatic ties.
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