Anchor: A Japanese daily says Tokyo does not intend to agree to a summit between the leaders of South Korea and Japan unless Seoul takes constructive steps to resolve the wartime forced labor issue. Tokyo, meanwhile, is expected to toughen its trade restrictions this week, removing South Korea from its "whitelist" of nations given preferential treatment.
Choi You Sun reports.

Report: The Sankei Shimbun reported Monday that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is unlikely to hold talks with South Korean President Moon Jae-in at upcoming international forums, including the United Nations General Assembly in September.

The newspaper said Abe will not agree to a summit with Moon unless South Korea offers constructive solutions to South Korean Supreme Court rulings that ordered Japanese firms to compensate Korean victims of wartime forced labor.

The two leaders also have opportunities to meet on the sidelines of a summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations to be held in Thailand in October and an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation gathering in Chile in November.

Sankei cited a Japanese foreign ministry official as saying consultations on a trilateral meeting of the leaders of South Korea, Japan and China this year are in limbo due to the diplomatic standoff between Seoul and Tokyo. 

The conservative daily said the move reflects Tokyo's position that it will wait for changes from Seoul, which it claims violated a 1965 bilateral treaty that normalized their diplomatic relations.

While Tokyo claims all reparation issues were settled with the treaty, Seoul has been refusing to meddle in the court rulings related to private citizens and Japanese firms.

In an apparent retaliation against the court rulings, the Abe administration recently enforced restrictions on three high-tech materials to South Korea used in the production of semiconductors and displays.

It's also preparing to get cabinet approval to remove South Korea from its "whitelist" of 27 countries given preferential treatment in export procedures as early as Friday.

The Nikkei, a Japanese financial daily, also reported that more than 40-thousand public comments were submitted regarding Tokyo's push to revise laws to remove South Korea from the whitelist, adding a majority supported the move.

A survey jointly conducted last week by The Nikkei and TV Tokyo found 58 percent of respondents support Tokyo's export restrictions on Seoul while 20 percent oppose them.
Choi You Sun, KBS World Radio News.