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UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on Wednesday an "important gesture" may be needed to mend Japan's ties with South Korea, frayed by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's annual visits to a shrine for war dead.

 

Annan flew to Japan for talks with officials, including Koizumi, following a visit to South Korea amid tension between the Asian neighbors, which almost led to a high-seas showdown over disputed islands last month.

 

"It may require some important gesture to ease the way forward and remove the impediments that may stand in the way of further development of this essential relationship," Annan told reporters in Tokyo after his meeting with Koizumi.

 

Koizumi declined to offer any ideas when asked what kind of gesture might be required to smooth over the troubled ties.

 

During his five years in power, Koizumi's annual visits to the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo where convicted war criminals are honored alongside the nation's war dead have raised hackles in South Korea, which suffered under a sometimes brutal Japanese occupation from 1910 to 1945, as well as in China.

 

Seoul and Beijing see the shrine as a symbol of Japan's past militarism, but Koizumi said his visits were intended to honor the war dead and pray for peace, not to glorify war.

 

Japan has often been compared unfavorably with Germany in terms of facing up to its wartime past.

 

In 1970, West German Chancellor Willy Brandt dropped to his knees in Warsaw's Jewish ghetto, a simple gesture of repentance that helped change his country's image around the world.

 

'The door is open'

 

Japanese leaders have apologized for the country's past actions but their words have never achieved the same impact, although analysts said this was partly due to the effect of the Cold War, which drew Western Europe together while dividing Asia.

 

Contradictory comments by Japanese politicians have also undermined the effect of the apologies.

 

In an interview with national broadcaster NHK shown later in the day, Annan said that people in South Korea and China feel that Japanese people and politicians have not repented sufficiently for their wartime past.

 

In addition to Koizumi's Yasukuni visits, Japan has come under fire from its Asian neighbors for approving school history textbooks that critics say whitewash its militarist past.

 

Tokyo and Seoul narrowly averted a maritime confrontation last month after South Korea put its coast guard on high alert to thwart a Japanese plan to send survey ships to waters near a group of islands over which both countries claim ownership.

 

In talks with Annan, a Foreign Ministry official quoted Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso as saying that the dispute over the isles, known as the Senkaku Islands in Japanese and Tokto in Korean, was a matter of territorial rights, not history, as South Korea argues.

 

Japan has made winning a seat on the UN Security Council a top foreign-policy goal.

 

But its bid was scuttled last year when some countries, including South Korea and China were opposed to Japan's membership, accusing Tokyo of failing to atone for its wartime past.

 

Annan leaves office on December 31 after two five-year terms, while Koizumi is due to bow out in September following more than five years as prime minister.

 

Expansion of the 15-nation council was one of several key reforms of the world body that Annan had hoped to push through.

 

"I won't say the Security Council reform is dead," Annan told Asian news organizations in an interview before his Asia tour.

 

"It is important for the UN to reform the Security Council and bring it in line with today's realities," Annan said, as quoted by Japan's Kyodo News.

 

"I have made it quite clear that as far as I am concerned, no UN reform will be complete without the reform of the Security Council," he said.

 

Japan had taken part in a failed joint campaign with Brazil, Germany and India for permanent seats on the Security Council.

 

Annan will head to China today on a five-nation tour of Asia.

 

(China Daily May 19, 2006)