South Korea's UNIQLO turns into a large profit.Where did the boycott movement go?Have we forgotten the past?
2021-12-28
Category:Japanese comfort woman problem
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Korea UNIQLO turns into a significant surplus in 2021
FRF El Korea, which operates Uniqlo in South Korea, has announced its results for fiscal year 2021 (September 1, 2020 to August 31, 2021).
Operating profit was 52.9 billion won (approximately 5.1 billion yen), a significant turnaround from a deficit of 88.4 billion won in the previous fiscal year. The company aimed to improve profits by reorganizing existing stores, and strengthened sales at its online store in response to increased demand for online shopping due to the spread of the new coronavirus.
One industry source said in an interview, ``The year after the boycott movement, the new coronavirus broke out.Uniqlo's shift to online was a blessing in disguise.''
MEMO Even in the midst of a country-wide boycott movement, it is amazing to see a return to surplus. The reason behind this seems to be the expansion of online shopping due to the coronavirus.
UNIQLO has become a symbol of the boycott movement
Fast Retailing's CFO Ken Okazaki said that ``boycotts will not last long,'' which infuriated the Korean media, and the fierce criticism of UNIQLO became heated.
Also, in the Korean UNIQLO commercial, a 13-year-old woman asks, "How did you used to dress when you were my age?" and a 98-year-old woman asks, "How did you use to dress when you were my age?" The woman further sparked a boycott by saying, "Oh my god, I can't remember that far back." as insulting to comfort women.
The 98-year-old woman was 13 years old during the Japanese colonial era, but she thought it was an insult to forget that. Looking at the results, CFO Okazaki's prediction was correct.
If he asked the boycotters about this, would he say, "I can't remember that far back"?
POINT FCO Okazaki seems to have a good understanding of the Korean national character of getting hot easily and getting cold easily. In addition, there seem to be many people who completely ignore self-contradiction.
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[related article]
The Korean National Police Agency’s landing on Takeshima is a strategy of disruption aimed at the Japan - U.S. - Korea trilateral foreign ministerial talks.
A joint press conference scheduled for November 17th in Washington, D.C., after the trilateral Foreign Ministers' Meeting between Japan, the United States, and South Korea, was canceled at short notice. U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman held a solo press conference on behalf of the three countries. Deputy Secretary of State Sherman said, ``There are bilateral differences between Japan and South Korea that need to be resolved. To that end, we have changed the format of the press conference.''
It is reported that the reason why the Japanese side refused to hold a joint press conference was that Korean National Police Agency Commissioner Kim Chang-ryong landed on Takeshima the day before the talks. Reports in South Korea said things like ``Japan destroyed America's face,'' ``Japan refused the interview without permission,'' and ``Deputy Secretary of State Sherman's solo press conference was a strange sight.''
In the first place, there seems to be no recognition that it was the South Korean side that took the outrageous step of landing on the Takeshima issue, which is a sensitive issue between Japan and South Korea, the day before the Japan-U.S.-Korea meeting. Moreover, the Commissioner of the National Police Agency is the head of the administrative agency.
The South Korean side is at fault in most of the Japan-Korea issues, but the reports published within South Korea only justify themselves.
In the first place, Takeshima is an inherent territory of Japan both historically and under international law. What South Korea should do is not for the Commissioner of the National Police Agency to land on Takeshima, but to go to the International Court of Justice and seek a decision based on international law. It is clear that the landing on Takeshima was carried out to coincide with the trilateral foreign ministerial talks between Japan, the United States, and South Korea.
This is related to the South Korean presidential election to be held in 2022, and is aimed at improving the current government's approval ratings, but the people most likely to be happy about this are China and North Korea. China is wary of Japan, the US, and South Korea getting closer.
That's why they started this commotion with the aim of holding talks between the vice ministers of foreign affairs between Japan, the US and South Korea. If you think about it this way, the objectives are completely consistent with what the Moon Jae-in administration has done thus far. And in this case, it can be said that that purpose was clearly demonstrated.
Since the Moon Jae-in administration came into power, the Takeshima issue has become more radical, and issues such as the Rising Sun flag, forced labor, and comfort women have all crossed the line. They are engaging in brinkmanship diplomacy that is on the verge of destroying Japan-South Korea relations.
These can be seen as an appeal to North Korea and China, and also seem to be a love call to be included in the Chinese economic bloc. The South Korean people are enthusiastic about these movements and support Moon Jae-in's popularity.
South Korea wants to join China and North Korea. This has been Moon Jae-in's wish from the beginning. If you look at it that way, everything you've said and done so far makes sense.
North Korea and China are authoritarian countries. Japan and the United States are democratic countries, and South Korea is also supposed to be a democratic country, but I wonder if the social system doesn't matter.The one country that the Moon Jae-in administration wants to get along with after saying goodbye to Japan and the United States is the UN sanctions resolution. One country that continues to suffer is North Korea, and one country that has been criticized by Europe, the United States, and Japan is China, which has been criticized for the Hong Kong issue, the Taiwan Strait issue, and the Uighur issue.
I feel like the future direction of Korea is becoming clearer.
Professor Ramseyer's negative statement [There is no evidence of forced abduction of comfort women] is a complete lie. [Translated excerpt of Yonhap News article]
On January 5th, Mark Ramseyer, a professor at Harvard Law School in the United States, who defined South Korean comfort women as "prostitutes" and received international backlash, has now proven that "comfort women were forced to be recruited." It is expected that there will be a stir by asserting that there are no contemporary documents that do so.
Professor Ramseyer made this clear on the 5th in his article ``Sexual Contracts in the Pacific War: Responses to Criticism'' posted on the Harvard Law School website.
In this paper, which is a rebuttal of previous criticisms directed at her, Professor Ramseyer argues that ``Korean women were drawn into [comfort women] by the Japanese military who fought against their will, regardless of their will.'' I will respond to the allegation,'' and declared, ``This allegation is false.''
At the same time, he asserted, `` Korean women were not forced to serve as comfort stations due to planned coercion by the Japanese military.''
He specifically argued that the 1983 book ``My War Crimes'' by Japanese author and activist Seiji Yoshida was the de facto basis for the forced recruitment of comfort women.
For 35 years after the end of the war, there was no evidence (proving forced conscription). It was only in the late 1980s that some Korean women began to advocate this."
He added, ``The comfort women debate started with Yoshida's 'fraud'''' and ``Most of the experts who criticized me were from Japan and South Korea, but even though they knew about this book, no one He also didn't mention this book."
Regarding the paper in question, Professor Ramseyer said, ``The core of the paper was about the contract, such as why the comfort women received advance payment and what conditions under the contract determined the women's working hours.'' ``However, none of the criticisms leveled at me were aimed at this kind of economic analysis.''
In a paper published that day, Professor Ramseyer cited a study last year by Lee Yuken, a co-author of ``Anti-Japanese Tribalism'' and a research committee member at the University of Economics Research Institute, which received support from far-right groups in Japan.
Professor Ramseyer also claimed that comfort women victims, who remained silent for a considerable period after the war, changed their words after they began demanding reparations from Japan.
In a situation where there is no document proving forced recruitment, the only evidence, the testimonies of victims, lacks credibility..
In particular, he referred to comfort woman victim Lee Yong-soo as ``the most notorious (of all the people who changed their words)''.
[Excerpt above]
Professor Ramseyer says that no evidence of her forced abduction or her contract has been found anywhere. Similarly, the Japanese government has made a cabinet decision under the Abe administration that there is no evidence of forced recruitment.
Japanese Military comfort woman A major flaw in the scrapping of the agreement is President Moon Jae In's dissolution of the Reconciliation and Healing Foundation.
The comfort women agreement is an official agreement
South Korea does not understand the agreement
2015 Comfort Women Agreement
The claim date is from 1965. Comfort women agreement establishes foundation
With the dissolution of the foundation, former comfort women cannot negotiate with Japan
In 2021, Moon Jae-in recognized the comfort women agreement as an official agreement between the governments. I wonder if these words were uttered out of a feeling that further deterioration of Japan-Korea relations would be a problem because it would affect the economy, regarding the lawsuit filed by former comfort women against the Japanese government. The problem is that the South Korean side doesn't fully understand the contents of the 2015 agreement.
Reading the comfort women agreement, it is clear that the main purpose of the agreement is for the South Korean government to establish a ``foundation'' to support former comfort women. Based on this assumption, the comfort women issue between the two countries will be finally and irreversibly resolved. In addition, we will refrain from blaming or criticizing each other regarding this issue in the international community. The Korean government will strive to resolve the issue of the girl statue in front of the Japanese Embassy in South Korea appropriately through consultations with related organizations. The order is as follows.
2015 comfort women agreement
Japanese side:
(2) The Japanese government has been sincerely addressing this issue, and based on its experience, it has recently decided to use the Japanese government's budget to heal the emotional wounds of all former comfort women. Take measures to ease the situation. Specifically, the South Korean government established a foundation for the purpose of supporting former comfort women, provided a lump sum of funds from the Japanese government's budget, and the Japanese and South Korean governments cooperated to provide support for all former comfort women. We will carry out projects to restore the honor and dignity of comfort women and heal their emotional wounds.
2. South Korean side:
(1) The Korean government evaluates the Japanese government's statements and efforts leading up to this announcement, and the Japanese government has confirmed the above 1. On the premise that the measures stated in (2) are steadily implemented, through this announcement we confirm that, together with the Japanese government, this issue will be finally and irreversibly resolved. The Government of the Republic of Korea will cooperate with the measures taken by the Government of Japan.
The comfort women agreement states that the South Korean government will establish a foundation and work through its activities to resolve issues with former comfort women.
In other words, the entire premise of this comfort women agreement was the establishment of a foundation, and as expected, Moon Jae-in dissolved this foundation. If this is recognized as an official agreement, there is an obligation to rebuild the ``Foundation for Reconciliation and Healing.'' Since this has not been done, even if South Korea says something, it will simply be bringing up a topic unrelated to the comfort women agreement. The issue of claims was resolved in 1965.
The purpose of establishing the foundation is to carry out projects to restore the honor and dignity of former comfort women and to heal their emotional wounds. Nowhere does it say that Japan should simply distribute the 1 billion yen it contributed. In other words, South Korea has abandoned its efforts to establish a foundation and restore the honor and dignity of former comfort women.
Looking at this from a different angle, with this agreement, the comfort women issue is no longer an issue between the governments of the two countries, but an issue between the foundation and the individual former comfort women. The former comfort women are demanding that Japan's prime minister meet in person and apologize, which is an unlikely request, but let's assume it happened. That can only be the result of negotiations conducted through the Reconciliation and Healing Foundation. Without the Foundation, no one can negotiate with Japan. This is not an issue of claims or human rights, but rather an issue of default by the South Korean government, which has abandoned its efforts to establish a foundation and resolve the issue.
If you confuse the claim rights issue with the comfort women agreement, you will lose sight of the essence. The major flaw in the cancellation of this agreement is that it dissolves the Foundation.
A Korean Peninsula man kidnapped a woman and ran a Japanese Military comfort woman mediation business.
On June 30, 1933, a woman (41 years old at the time) with a husband and children was arrested in addition to a 35-year-old Korean Peninsula man who kidnapped a girl on the street and sold her to China.One of the kidnapped girls was sold to a 35-year-old man for 20 won and killed.
On April 5, 1933, Oh Cho-woong, a broker on the Korean Peninsula operating under the pseudonym Hannam, was arrested for counterfeiting his family register and obtaining permission to do business in South Gyeongsang Province bought a 16-year-old girl for 350 yen.
Kim Bok-soon, a female broker disguised as a lady, has been arrested.Kim Bok-soon led a group of four men and women, including Lee Jin-ok, who kidnapped 28 girls on the Korean Peninsula on December 31, 1935.Kim Bok-soon sold the girls to Joo Sung-ok in the primary and received a brokerage fee of 15 to 150 yen.
Daughter Kidnapping: Chun Doo-hwan (58 years old at the time) of Gaifuku Village in Gunsan, Busan, was arrested on November 15, 1938 for preparing a power of attorney to sell to a 19-year-old and 17-year-old woman in Manchuria.
Ha Yoon-myung's case: He is also a man of considerable wealth in Gyeongseong.He cleverly persuaded his parents, "I have children and daughters, so how about your daughter?" and paid 10 yen in advance to take over the family daughter (18 years old at the time).After that, I took my daughter to Tianjin, Republic of China, not Gyeongseong, and sold it for 1,000 yen.
On March 28, 1939, the Asahi Shimbun reported that Kim Oh-man and his family were arrested in Roh Moo Hyun Mountain, Gyeonggi Province.Since 1935, the Kim Oman family has been working as adopted daughters in rural areas across the Korean Peninsula and trafficked women in Manchuria.
Tan Jang-yeon case: Tan Jang-yeon, who was arrested after Ha Yoon-myung and his wife, sold more than 100 rural women to North China and Manchuria from 1935 to 1939.It was also revealed that lower-ranking civil servants cooperated in forging family registers.
The Japanese government's response strengthened the crackdown on sex traffickers from 1937 to 1938, and issued an order of caution against the crackdown on intermediaries.
Choi Myung-ho's case: On May 13, 1939, the Korean Peninsula edition of the Osaka Asahi Shimbun reported the girl's testimony.Choi Myeong-ho was hired as a maid, and Choi Myeong-ho became 16 entrepreneurs, including department store guides, nurses, and female clerks in Gyeongseong.The girl was found by Choi Myung-ho and his gang while trying to escape from the business contact book.After that, he was imprisoned and kicked with his foot day and night .
Busan Otome Trading Incident: Yoo In-ma, who was engaged in Otome Trading, was arrested in August 1939.The Dong-A Ilbo reported on August 31, 1939, that 45 brokers in Busan kidnapped more than 100 women.Companies cleverly said, "Manchuria is doing well."
Fraud Kidnapping: According to the Asahi Shimbun's Namseon edition on November 21, 1939, Kim Dong-yoon, a former temporary employee of Busan Prefecture, kidnapped a woman and a woman through official seal forgery.There were 28 victims, many of whom were kidnapped in the direction of Namyang.
What is the Japanese Military confort woman problem?Human trafficking was frequent on the Korean Peninsula, and people on the Korean Peninsula at that time were responsible for it.The Japanese police were cracking down on these.
The ``Jongdaehyup'' lost its position due to the comfort women agreement - The Japanese and South Korean governments have agreed to establish a foundation.
Private/government debt 254%
Household debt is 104.2% of GDP
Global trend of interest rate hikes
Mortgage reduces disposable income
A traveler who just has bad manners
In a statement distributed in advance of the conference, Professor Ham Joon-ho of Yonsei University Graduate School of International Studies, who served as a member of the Bank of Korea's Financial and Monetary Committee, stated, ``Korea's macro leverage (private and government debt) level has expanded to 254% of GDP. ” he pointed out.
The household debt balance has continued to expand for 16 years, reaching a record high of 1,850.9 trillion won (approximately 176.9871 trillion yen) in the April-June 2021 period. According to a study by the Institute of International Finance (IIF), Japan's GDP ratio was 104.2%, the highest among 37 major countries and regions. Incidentally, the countries other than South Korea are followed by Hong Kong (92.0%), the UK (89.4%), and the US (79.2%).
On the 15th, the Federal Reserve Board (FRB), the central bank of the United States, announced the first major interest rate hike in about 30 years. The policy rate will be raised by 0.75% to a range of 1.50 to 1.75%.
Prior to this, South Korea announced that it would raise its policy interest rate from 1.5% to 1.75% in May. The rate was set at 1.5% in April, making this the second consecutive month of interest rate hikes. This will also be a severe blow to those who are burdened with household debt.
South Korea's per capita GDP is approaching that of Japan. According to the 2021 IMF announcement, Japan's price is $39,340 and South Korea's price is $34,801. However, Japan's household debt is around 66-7%.
Housing loans are the largest component of household debt. The skyrocketing price of land in Seoul continues to skyrocket, forcing many to borrow large sums of money to purchase apartments. As a result, even if GDP and wages rise, most of the money goes toward repaying household debts, resulting in less disposable income. I don't have any money to spend.
Even after salaries are paid, the money goes straight through the tunnel and is returned to financial institutions, where it is returned to the market. This is the reality of GDP per capita in the Korean economy.
As the coronavirus pandemic begins to subside and overseas travel is gradually lifted, travel to Japan is expected to become a boom again in South Korea. It's not that they like Japan. The above reasons are largely responsible for why Japan is chosen as a nearby travel destination.
And just because you come to Japan doesn't mean you have to spend money. There are quite a few groups that find faults, point them out, and complain to each other. It is said that Korean tourists just have bad manners.