Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida is scheduled to visit South Korea for two days from next Sunday to confirm cooperation with President Yoon Suk Yeol to further improve bilateral ties, sources close to the matter said.
A senior government official on Monday informed the ruling Liberal Democratic Party of Kishida's plan to visit South Korea, which would mark his first trip to the neighboring country since taking office in October 2021, the sources said.
Japan-South Korea relations had plunged to the lowest point in decades under the left-wing government of Yoon's predecessor, Moon Jae In, over a dispute over wartime labor compensation.
But they have been improving as the conservative government of Yoon, who took office in May 2022, proposed a solution to the issue in early March. He visited Tokyo later in that month for talks with Kishida.
They agreed then to restart reciprocal visits by Japanese and South Korean leaders, which had been suspended since 2011. Kishida subsequently decided to make an early visit to South Korea, the sources said.
The last visit to South Korea by a Japanese premier was in February 2018, when then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe attended the opening ceremony of the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics.
Tokyo and Seoul have long been at odds over issues related to Japan's colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula between 1910 and 1945.
Kishida has hoped to pave the way for a successful Group of Seven summit in his home constituency of Hiroshima later this month. He has invited Yoon to the gathering as a guest.
