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(2nd LD) Seoul seeks help from China, Japan in locating Ahn Jung-geun's remains
By Lee Chi-dong
SEOUL, March 24 (Yonhap) -- South Korea has formally asked China and Japan to help in efforts to locate the remains of a highly revered Korean independence fighter, after President Lee Myung-bak ordered his government to work with the neighboring countries on the stalled project, a government source said Wednesday.
The government also said it will launch a team of experts to search for the remains of Ahn Jung-geun (1877-1910), who assassinated a Japanese statesman overseeing Japan's colonization of the Korean Peninsula a century ago.
South Korea's decades-long efforts to find Ahn's remains has drawn public attention, as this week marks the 100th anniversary of Ahn's death after assassinating the Korean Peninsula's first Japanese Governor-General Hirobumi Ito in Harbin, northeastern China, in October 1909.
"President Lee, presiding over the (weekly) meeting of senior secretaries on March 22, said South Korea needs to push for joint efforts with China and Japan to excavate Ahn's remains," the source said, requesting anonymity.
Relevant authorities, including the foreign ministry and the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs, have already begun the process, added the source.
The Foreign Ministry plans to officially raise the issue at an upcoming three-way meeting of their foreign ministers, a ministry official said.
"The government has been requesting China and Japan's cooperation in finding the remains of Ahn, and the issue will be discussed at the foreign ministerial meeting of South Korea, Japan and China if necessary," the official said on condition of anonymity.
The meeting will be held on the South Korean resort island of Jeju in May before a three-way summit of the countries' leaders.
The patriots affairs agency said it will form a team of about 10 government officials and experts to search for the remains. The team will visit China to trace Ahn's remains and track down related records in Japan, China and Russia, the agency said.
The president is also expected to make official comments in public about the government's position on the issue of locating Ahn's remains around Friday, the anniversary of his death, according to the source.
Ahn is a highly symbolic figure in Korea's independence movement against Japan's brutal colonization of the peninsula from 1910-45 and South Korea has long sought to find his remains.
Such efforts, however, have made little progress due to a lack of cooperation from Japan which has various records on Ahn. China's help is also imperative.
Patriots and Veterans Affairs Minister Kim Yang told reporters here earlier this week that his agency's campaign to find the remains has been "discouraged several times by Japan's lackluster response."
Contradicting Japan's longstanding claim that it does not possess any relevant information related to Ahn's imprisonment or execution, the Seoul ministry said recently it uncovered records related to him and 228 other Korean independence fighters.
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