US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke on Wednesday, on the sidelines of the G7 meeting in London, with his Japanese and South Korean counterparts and allies on the North Korean issue, while Washington called on Pyongyang to engage through diplomatic channels.
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Before this trilateral meeting, at the end of which the three officials made no comment, Antony Blinken had considered it essential to collaborate with Tokyo and Seoul on this subject. The meeting comes days after Joe Biden reviewed US policy towards North Korea. The US president said at the end of April that he would use "
diplomacy as well as severe deterrence
" to contain Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions, an approach denounced as "
hostile
" by the North Koreans.
"
We wanted to ensure that we very actively consult the countries concerned, starting with our close allies, South Korea and Japan, given their very strong interests in this issue,
" said Antony Blinken on Monday. The two Asian countries have close economic ties and are both very close allies of Washington. But their relationship has been plagued for decades by historical disputes dating back to the time of the colonization of Korea by Japan, between 1910 and 1945.
The quarrel degenerated in 2019 with serious trade and diplomatic tensions, which almost led to the termination of a military intelligence-sharing agreement that was crucial in particular for US policy vis-à-vis North Korea. In April, the South Korean Foreign Ministry expressed its "
deep disappointment
" at the continued Japanese tributes to Yasukuni, a shrine "
glorifying colonial exploitation
" and the country's "
aggression
" policy. Japan.