S. Korea renews call for Japan to retract trade curbs after giving deadline of end-May

SEOUL, May 13 (Yonhap) -- South Korea renewed its call for Japan on Wednesday to "swiftly retract" export restrictions imposed in a row over wartime forced labor, the foreign ministry said, a day after Seoul gave Tokyo until the end of this month to put it into action. Kim Jung-han, director-general for Asia and Pacific affairs at Seoul's foreign ministry, repeated the call during phone talks with his Japanese counterpart, Shigeki Takizaki, earlier in the day, the ministry said in a press release. The phone call comes a day after South Korea's trade ministry demanded Japan take steps to lift the trade curbs by the end of May, citing that Korea has revised its trade laws to ensure better control and monitoring of exports related to conventional weapons. "Director Kim explained the measures we have taken, including the revision of the law, and urged the Japanese government to swiftly retract the unfair export restrictions," the ministry said. Japan slapped export restrictions against South Korea in apparent retaliation for South Korean Supreme Court rulings that ordered Japanese firms to compensate Korean victims of forced labor when Korea was a Japanese colony from 1910-45. Seoul hit back with a decision to terminate a military information-sharing pact with Tokyo but later suspended the termination decision at the last minute as the two sides agreed to resolve the matters through diplomacy. The two sides have held a series of working-level talks between foreign ministry officials and also between trade authorities but have made little progress. In Wednesday's talks, they also exchanged views on other issues of mutual concern, including discussing ways to tackle the coronavirus pandemic, the ministry said. In particular, Kim thanked Japan for its assistance in the return of a young South Korean girl battling leukemia from India amid the virus crisis. The girl and her family flew out of the country aboard a special flight arranged by Japan Airlines and arrived in Korea via Tokyo early this month. Kim and Takizaki also shared assessments on the outbreak situation in each other's countries and agreed on the importance of keeping close communication so as to cope with the disease and protect the citizens living abroad. The two diplomats last met face-to-face in February and most recently talked in a videoconference early last month. elly@yna.co.kr (END)