Korea agrees to register Japan's Sado Mine as UNESCO World Heritage Site

An exit of the Sado Mine in Niigata Prefecture, Japan, which is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, on July 28. Yonhap News

Controversy is brewing over the Yoon Suk-yeol government’s agreement to register Japan's Sado Island gold and silver mines as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, where Korean workers in the Japanese colonial era were forcibly mobilized. This is due to the criticism that Japan's actions to get its history right are insufficient, including the omission of “forced labor” from the description of the Sado Mine. Japan has also failed to honor its promise that it made when registering Hashima Island, also known as Battleship Island, as a World Heritage Site in 2015, raising criticism that the government was stabbed in the back as it sided with Japan again.

The UNESCO World Heritage Committee (WHC) listed Japan's Sado Mine in Niigata Prefecture as a World Heritage Site with the consent of all member states, including Korea, at a meeting in New Delhi, India on July 27.

The WHC's advisory body, the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), recommended in June that the registration be put on hold and that facilities be installed to tell the “full history” of the site, including forced labor. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Korea said it agreed to the registration on the premise that Japan would “faithfully implement the recommendation and take preemptive measures to do so."

Japan promised three things. First, it will dedicate one-tenth of the space at the Aikawa Folk Museum, the former administration office of the Sado Mine, to an exhibition on forced labor. The exhibit explains that some 1,000 Korean laborers were forced to do more dangerous work than their Japanese counterparts, working an average of 28 days a month and not getting paid properly. This is also included in the “appendix” of the museum's promotional brochure. Preparations for this were completed and the space was opened to the public on July 28.

Japan also decided to set up information boards at the site of the dormitories and communal kitchens of the Korean laborers. It promised to hold a memorial ceremony for both Japanese and Korean laborers starting this year.

However, no expressions of "forced" or "forced labor" were used in the exhibits of the Aikawa Folk Museum in relation to Korean workers.

There are no specific references to the coercive nature of conscription, nor is there any assessment of Japan’s colonial rule and invasion.

Japan's Yomiuri Shimbun reported on the 28th that “the governments of Korea and Japan have agreed not to use the phrase ‘forced labor’ and instead describe the living conditions of the laborers at the time.”

In addition, the Aikawa Folk Museum is a small building with parking for 20 cars, and the exhibition space related to forced mobilization is only one-tenth of the museum's total space. Even though there is a nearby museum called "Kirarium Sado," which can park 157 cars and three buses, there is no exhibition related to forced mobilization. Even the memorial service is more in honor of Japanese laborers than the Koreans.

Questions arise as to how sincere the Japanese government will be in implementing its promises. The WHC recommendation is not a compulsory provision. Japan did not keep its promise that it made when registering Hashima Island. Facilities to inform the “whole history,” such as forced mobilization, were installed in Tokyo, 980 kilometers from the island, and Japan has not documented its human rights violations against Korean laborers.

Some point out that Japan is even less likely to fulfill its promise regarding Hashima Island. This is because there is more room for Japan to interpret the Korean government’s agreement to the registration of the Sado Mine as a signal of Korea’s acquiescence to Japan’s unfulfilled promises related to Hashima Island.

※This article has undergone review by a professional translator after being translated by an AI translation tool.