South Korea's Supreme Court on Thursday rejected an appeal by a South Korean temple, affirming a high court ruling that a Japanese temple is the rightful owner of a 14th-century Buddha statue stolen from the temple on an island in southwestern Japan in 2012.
The statue, absconded by South Korean thieves, has been recovered by local authorities. The South Korean temple asserted that the statue was looted from it by Japanese pirates centuries ago and sought its handover from the South Korean government.
The top court's ruling comes at a time when Japan-South Korea relations have been improving after the administration of South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol pledged to resolve a long-standing wartime labor dispute with Japan in March.
At a news conference in Tokyo, Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Hideki Murai said the Japanese government "will urge the South Korean government to promptly return the Buddha statue" to its owner, the Japanese temple, following the ruling.
South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman Lim Soo Suk said the government respects the top court's decision, adding that the necessary procedures for returning the statue will be carried out in accordance with the relevant laws.
In 2017, the Daejeon District Court ordered the statue stolen from Kannonji, a temple on Japan's Tsushima Island in Nagasaki Prefecture, to be handed over to Buseok Temple in Seosan, southwest of Seoul, leading to a worsening of bilateral ties.
In February this year, the Daejeon High Court overturned the district court ruling and said the statue belongs to the Japanese temple.
The top court said in the ruling that it recognizes the Seoju Buseok Temple, which made the statue in the 14th century, to be the same temple as the current Buseok Temple.
A representative of Buseoksa temple in Seosan, South Korea, speaks to reporters at the Supreme Court in Seoul on Oct. 26, 2023, after the country's top court ruled that a Buddha statue stolen from a Japanese temple in 2012 belongs to the temple, rejecting the South Korean temple's claim to ownership of it. (Kyodo) ==Kyodo
But the court supported the high court, which concluded the South Korean temple can no longer claim ownership of the statue given the number of years it has been in the possession of the Japanese temple, and this satisfied the legal requirements for Kannonji to be recognized as the rightful owner under Japan's Civil Code.
Setsuryo Tanaka, the chief priest of Kannonji, told reporters in Tsushima the ruling was "reasonable" and that he wanted the Buddha statue to be returned to the Japanese temple.
The South Korean temple's chief priest, Won Woo, condemned the ruling.
"Our Supreme Court has legalized armed and illegal looting. This is such a barbaric ruling, and we cannot accept it at all," Won said.
Nagasaki has designated the Buddha statue as the prefecture's cultural property.
