SEOUL – South Korea will not send officials to Saturday’s memorial service at the Sado Island Gold Mines, a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage site in Niigata Prefecture, it was learned Wednesday. It will be the third consecutive year of South Korea’s absence from the memorial service, which honors workers at the now-defunct mines. According to a South Korean government source, Seoul held serious consultations with the Japanese side but could not reach an agreement on key disputed points.
The two sides are believed to remain at odds over whether laborers from the Korean Peninsula were forced to work at the mines. The South Korean government is expected to hold a separate memorial ceremony this year as well. In 2024, the Sado gold mines were added to the UNESCO World Heritage list after Japan gained the consent of South Korea, which had claimed that the mines were a site of forced labor, by promising to hold an annual memorial ceremony for all workers at the mines.
This July, the UNESCO World Heritage Committee adopted a resolution calling for improvements to the site’s exhibits to provide a comprehensive view of the history of mining on the island. The South Korean government source urged Japan to comply with the resolution fully and in good faith.
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