Speech by Minister for Foreign Affairs Yoriko Kawaguchi at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan

Q: Madam Foreign Minister, you just mentioned that in the talks today the North Koreans of course want some sort of security guarantee from the United States. We do not know if that will happen but should that happen, how will that impact the US-Japan security defense agreement? Were North Korea to unleash missiles at Tokyo let us say, would that prescind a reaction from the US?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: As I said, North Korea is interested in finding some ways to guarantee their security, and the North Koreans have been saying a bilateral treaty of non-invasion between the Republic of Korea and the United States. The United States for Japan is an only ally, and we have a security treaty with the United States and we depend on the nuclear deterrence which the US provides. Whatever the outcome-and we do not know how the talks with the North Koreans will develop except that we know that it will take a long time, it is a long process-whatever form that takes, we know that that the United States will not do something that would jeopardize our alliance relationship. We have been talking about nuclear deterrence and also there are chemical and biological weapons which they may or may not have, we do not know. Whatever arrangements will be made it has to be something that will satisfy all the countries nearby, and that includes Japan. It also has to be in accordance with the United Nations Charter or international law which stipulates what can be done and what cannot be done.

Q: Minister Kawaguchi, I have a question about Japan's relationship with Iran. The Foreign Minister of Iran is coming here today and will be holding talks with you tomorrow. This is coming as continued concerns arise about Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program and its possession of, it appears, enriched uranium. Also at the same time, it appears that the oil deal between Japan and Iran over the Azadegan oil field is going ahead, or has reportedly been making progress. I am wondering if you will be discussing that oil deal in your talks with Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharazi and what you will be saying to him about Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program as well, and whether there will be any kind of stipulation made about requiring Iran to comply more fully with international inspections and International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) requirements before any kind of commercial oil deal might be signed with Iran. Do you have any other thoughts about the best way for the international community to resolve Iran's nuclear issue? Thank you.

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: Japan shares with the international community concerns over the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and nuclear weapons concerns. We are glad that the IAEA is there talking to the Iranians and Iran seems to be strengthening its cooperation with the IAEA. I will be telling the Foreign Minister exactly the same thing that I told him on the telephone some ten days ago or so. I told him at that time that Iran should remove the concerns of the international society on their nuclear development program. Iran will have to sign the Additional Protocol and also ratify and implement it. By doing so, Iran can remove the concerns of the international community.

Furthermore, there are other things that the IAEA has talked about in terms of IAEA's questions on a possible nuclear development program or weapons development program of Iran. I also told Foreign Minister Kharazi that Iran will have to answer the questions posed by the IAEA.

We also said that we are happy to share with Iran our experiences of signing and concluding the Additional Protocol of the IAEA. We have done so and we are being inspected by IAEA and some of the experiences perhaps will help Iran remove their concerns on the possible, for instance, misuse of information by the IAEA, etc. I assured him that there is no need for Iran to worry about the misuse of information by getting our specialists to talk to Iranian specialists to help remove their concerns and help them move forward on this. That is basically what we have been talking to the Iranians about on the nuclear front.

On the oil front, as you realize we are scarce in many natural resources, but oil happens to be one of them. We depend for almost 99 percent of our oil on outside sources. Therefore, to secure oil has been a very important policy goal for Japan. So we have been conducting discussions and negotiations with Iran on this. This is a separate issue from the nuclear weapons issue that we are dealing with. We do share the concerns of the international community on the nuclear issue, so we do our best to help Iran and encourage Iran to remove them. We would like Iran to conclude the Additional Protocol and take steps. We are, as a separate matter, currently engaged in discussions with Iran on oil but no conclusion has been reached on this.

Q: Thank you, Minister Kawaguchi. I would just like to follow up on, in your words, the concern of the international community over nuclear arms. I do not know if you include the Arabic countries as part of the international community or not, but my information tells me that most of these countries are not really worried about the Iranian nuclear ambitions or North Koreans. They are more worried about the Israeli nuclear arsenal. So I do not see in your policies any insistence or any real interest on following up this issue. Rather you follow up trying the pressure the countries that are in the "axis of evil" to prevent them from developing nuclear arms. In the same way, you enjoy the protection of the American nuclear weapons or the American nuclear umbrella. Do you not find this kind of policy contradictory?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: First Japan is the only one country on earth which has fallen victim to nuclear bombs. That makes Japanese nationals strongly for the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) and all other instruments which would stop proliferation and production development of nuclear weapons. We are for this and we have been advocating this. In early September, there will be a meeting in Vienna on the CTBT. I will be going there and I will be speaking there to promote the CTBT.

Therefore, for any country-Israel or North Korea or whichever-we are concerned. Also, I have been telling the Israelis, and I told him the same thing yesterday, when I spoke with Foreign Minister Shalom of Israel, that Israel should commit itself to the NPT, CTBT and other international frameworks for this purpose. And we have been telling the North Koreans, we have been telling all others.

Your question is whether this contradicts with our depending on the United States for nuclear deterrence. My answer is no. There is no contradiction. You have to think that there are in fact countries which own nuclear weapons. Weapons of all sorts proliferate. In reality, since we have decided not to own any nuclear weapons, we will have to depend on others to protect ourselves and depend on someone who has nuclear deterrents. Our goal is that in the long run, these countries will reduce these nuclear weapons and eventually we will not have them. That is the ultimate goal. In the meantime, we need to protect ourselves so there is no contradiction.

Q: According to press reports, Japan, the Republic of Korea and the US tried to work out a sort of counterproposal to put it on the table at the negotiations in Beijing. They were not able to work out a proposal to put on the table. Why not?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: We, the three countries, have been coordinating our views and actions vis-a-vis North Korea. We have been doing this for some time. In fact, the major reason for the North Koreans to decide to come to this table of six countries is because we coordinated our steps and our views, and then worked so hard to convince the North Koreans that it is the only way we can deal with and take care of their security concerns and other concerns that they have, and also that it is the only way that they can talk to us to take care of our concerns for North Koreans.

We have been talking about various elements which we would need to pursue to get the North Koreans to the talks so that they can take care of our concerns and, at the same time, which will enable us to take care of their concerns. Our position is that on the condition that they commit themselves to the right action, we are ready to talk about their security concerns, energy concerns and other concerns.

We have not said that we would propose them a joint three-country proposal. That may eventually have to come out of the six country meeting. However, there are, for instance, questions as to whether it is wise to do something like this at the very beginning. We can talk about these elements-Japan certainly will do so but I cannot speak for other countries, they have their own views. Hopefully, we will come out of this meeting a step ahead, with a hope for the future. It is important in every country's view attending the meeting. At least in the five countries' view, it is important to come out from this meeting, with a will to continue into the future, to have an agreement or sense of coming of minds that if this next meeting is good, then this is a success.

Q: Sorry to pull you back to the question of Iran for a moment, but you have said that the issue of the oil field development is a separate issue from the nuclear concerns. But can you, given the US concerns and then, as you mentioned, the international community as a whole, is it possible that Japan would go ahead with the deal on the oil field development without some agreement by Iran to sign the Additional Protocol?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: As we have been pressing Iran that it is very important for them to sign and implement the Additional Protocol of the IAEA, we have been telling them and we have been helping them so they can move forward to that direction. As I was saying, supply of oil to Japan is a very important issue. We have nothing, no oil in Japan, so it is important.

These are two separate policy goals, and we have not come to a point where we need to discuss these together. We pursue one, policies regarding WMD concerns, and also we pursue our goal to have supply of oil taken care of. These are two, as I have said, separate policy issues and each one is important.

Q: You said that faith in the UN had dropped as a result of what happened prior to the Iraqi invasion. I think many people opposed to the war believed that faith in the UN was restored because people opposed the war, and stopped America's railroading of other countries into approving a resolution that they did not want. Can you tell me why you think that faith in the UN dropped? And if Japan became a permanent member what can it contribute to the UN from a political point of view?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: I am not sure if I understood your question perfectly, but I was talking about the situation before the war. It seems to me that you are talking about the situation now?

Q: No, the same situation.

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: The same situation that I was addressing, too.

The reason why I said faith in the United Nations dropped is because the United Nation Security Council could not come to a meeting of minds. If you think of that, the United Nation Security Council, historically, was able to function best when the five permanent members could agree. Because they could not agree, they could not function or they could not act together. That was what I was referring to. But since then, new resolutions have been agreed such as Resolutions 1483 and 1500. We hope that these will be the key to bringing the minds of the countries together to help the Iraqi people reconstruct their country back to a peaceful state.

Q: And the political role in the UN?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: We were working before, before force was used on Iraq, to get the countries together, and we were not able to do so. We were doing this outside the United Nations Security Council by placing telephone calls. I made telephone calls, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi made telephone calls. That was the only way we could do something. However, if we were in the United Nations Security Council, we would be able to work better in that situation by coming up, for instance, with a resolution proposal or talking to the countries that are represented there. We can act more directly on the scene.

Q: Mrs. Kawaguchi, are you for or against the revision of Article 9 of the Constitution? Please answer yes or no.

About Iraq, it seems to me that Japan wants to send troops to places where there is no danger at all, which seems to me strange, because they would not be that useful. So why would you send troops anyway?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: If you ask a question to any minister in the Cabinet, whether one likes Article 9, the answer of course is yes. And my answer is yes.

For the second part of the question, really the answer stems from Article 9 of our Constitution. We are not allowed, other than for self-defense purposes, to use our forces. We can only use our arms if we are attacked, but otherwise we are not to engage in the use of forces with other military forces or any others. That means that we cannot engage in combat with others, and that is why we have to place our Self-Defense Forces in the area where there is no possibility of our Self-Defense Forces to be placed in a situation that could be construed as violating Article 9.

Q: Minister Kawaguchi, you are a diplomat, so what you said about the UN was very diplomatic. However, is the bottom line of what you said, "Look, either you give us a place on the Security Council or we are going to cut our dues"?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: What I said is precisely the opposite. I was saying that the fact that we are paying our dues enables us to talk about United Nations reform. We will be paying our dues.

Q: Japan is getting ready to take a decision on ballistic missile defense. Budget requests are going in very soon. If the threat from North Korea is eliminated through a negotiated agreement, is it still necessary for Japan to deploy such a system? And considering that this would increase Japan's dependence on the US, on its satellites and its missile-makers, how would this change the diplomatic environment in East Asia?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: Your question has many ifs, and it is difficult to answer the questions on the assumption that something is going to happen. But we have not said that we will deploy the missile defense system. We are studying part of it. I mean, it is a huge system and has many components, but we are engaged in only a part of that in the form of a joint study with the United States. So we have not decided whether we would deploy it.

The second part of your question was the effect of deployment on Asia. Since we have not decided, I cannot talk about that. It all depends. Lots of things depend on the security situation and how we decide on what we need to do to take care of our security concerns, in turn, depends on the developments nearby. We have not decided to deploy and whether we will decide to deploy or not depends on what prevails in this region at that time. And we do not know what is going to prevail.

Q: I just wanted to follow up on the very first question and just wanted to ask you to elaborate a little bit more on the point you raised in answering the first question. You said in answering the first question that whatever sort of agreement is made between the United States and North Korea, that would not jeopardize or undermine the security treaty between the United States and Japan. I am wondering, was there a concrete discussion between Japan and the US about this prior to the meeting, and what sort of assurance did you get from the US about this?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: We have not talked with the US as to what sort of security guarantee it is going to give to the North Koreans. We know that Japan and the US are good allies. We have a very good bilateral relationship, and we know that the US is not going to do anything that will jeopardize our alliance relationship. Japan also on its part has been making efforts to have a good alliance relationship, so there is no way that the US will come up with anything that is against international law, anything that is against the alliance relationship represented, for instance, by the security treaty of our two countries.

Q: The Government of Japan has said that it would not hand over former President Fujimori to Peru because he was Japanese, and they did not have an extradition treaty with Peru. But because Mr. Fujimori is Japanese, the Japanese penal code allows Japanese to be prosecuted for committing crimes like those he is accused of committing in Peru, namely murder. Which do you intend to do, protect President Fujimori as a Japanese or prosecute him as a Japanese?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: Right now, we are in the process of studying the document of the Peruvian Government, but we have a law in Japan that does not allow us to send Japanese citizens to a foreign country, to extradite them. So that is one law that we have which is the foundation. Beyond that we are studying the documents of the Peruvian government at the moment.

Q: But prosecuting Japanese for crimes committed overseas is also possible through the penal code, is it not?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: Well, we are studying the big document by the Peruvian Government and we have not determined whether that necessitates us to do so or not. We have not come to that conclusion.

Q: We really think that Kim Jong-Il is himself a WMD, and even if we save his neck this time, I do not think he would change. You know, he is asking at this six-party meeting that his regime be saved but I know it would not help the North Korean people. What do you think, Minister Kawaguchi?

Maybe I am too simple-minded, but I have spoken to many people around the world, and everybody agrees that he is worse than Saddam.

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: I know that people think in many ways, but whom they would like to have as their ruler is up to the nationals of that country. So it is up to the North Koreans to decide. It is not for me or anyone here to decide.

Q: Regarding the new appointment of Ms. Sadako Ogata as the President of JICA, are there any changes to Japan's policies for international aid to developing countries?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: Simply the answer is no. No change. In fact we are going to do what we have been doing. We hope that she can bring to our policies with her expertise and experiences in the international field, contributions which will better our assistance policies toward developing countries. We do not know at this point exactly what, but I know that she will bring us changes for the better.

Q: Throughout the past year it has seemed that China's position regarding North Korea has actually been much closer to position of Japan and the Republic of Korea than the United States' position has been sometimes. China has been a consistent advocate of peaceful solution, whereas the US has gone back and forth. I was wondering if you could perhaps describe Japan's relationship with the Chinese negotiators and the relative importance to the US negotiating team?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: We have been having a very good and close relationship with China on this North Korean issue. We have been communicating very closely with the Chinese. We also keep in close touch of course with the United States and coordinating our views and our steps.

I do not know what makes you think that we are closer to China than we are to the US, but we communicate with both of them. In that sense perhaps we coordinate our views more closely with the US and the Republic of Korea, but without Chinese efforts this six-country meeting would not have been possible. We thank the Chinese Government for this, and we continue to have a very good and close relationship.

How different our view is going to be from the Chinese, we do not know. We do not think there are any major differences with the Chinese Government's thinking on North Korea. We are perfectly together on not allowing nuclear weapons to exist on the Korean Peninsula. Also when it comes to actual steps of what we do or in what order we may or may not differ from each other, but these things we need to discuss and we do not know yet at this point.

Q: Do you think that on balance the world is a safer or less safe place since President George W. Bush embarked on the war against terrorism?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: Whether you think we are safer or less safer depends on where you stand. I can say that the nature of the threat has changed. Not because of the United States attacking Iraq but that was the cause which brought all the developments that have been taking place in the international community recently.

There was an attack on September 11 and that made us realize the danger of weapons of mass destruction as well as the danger of terrorist activities. We are concerned of what these two combined could bring us. It is a different type of threat from what existed back in the Cold War days. The nature of the threat has changed, so the international community has been responding to the new changes in the threat. That is what is happening now. That is my view of the situation.

Mr. Belkind: Two of my fellow directors have questions. They usually do not go out from the head table but since we have a good atmosphere going, it will also enable me to make up for a faux pas. I am still new as president learning the ropes and I forgot to introduce my fellow directors because I was so keen to get the press conference going, but I do not want to have a coup d'etat staged after this.

Nobuko Hara is the Secretary and Director. Haruko Watanabe is the distinguished Second Vice-President in charge of Human Resources. On my right is Monzurul Huq who is a distinguished journalist from Bangladesh who is one of the directors-at-large and has been very active in organizing an upcoming event that I mentioned to the Foreign Minister. Monzurul, I mentioned that you might want to send an invitation to her for our first Bangladesh night full of culture.

Q: I hope I will not let you down but anyway it is something that has been on my mind for a long time and it is a good opportunity to clear this. In May we had as a guest speaker Dr Priscilla Elworthy. She is head the Oxford Research Group, she has been nominated a couple of times for the Nobel Peace Prize, and she is reputed to be an international expert on nuclear weapons. She raised a concern that in the post-Iraq war environment, if the tension in Korea continues there are concerns that there will be pressure on Japan to join the world nuclear weapons club. Can you envisage that ever happening or do you already sense that?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: I do not think that will happen in Japan. We have chosen not to be a member of the nuclear club by joining the NPT-that is our international commitment-and also by passing a law which talks about the peaceful use of nuclear energy. We also have the Three Non-Nuclear Principles: not to own, not to produce and not to permit them brought in. So we have an international commitment and also a domestic policy decision that was made before. I know that many countries talk about this and it seems that people are interested but my answer is definitely no. We would be breaking an international commitment if we did.

Q: Since everybody is asking security questions, I would like to ask you a surface question. Our president just mentioned that you recruited 20 civilians for 120 ambassadorships. That is almost about 20 percent. I would like to ask about Mrs. Ogata's golden parachute, or rather platinum parachute to JICA's presidency. Is it also your recruitment or do you just take collective responsibility as Foreign Minister?

Foreign Minister Kawaguchi: She has been-I should not say my mentor because I do not think she thinks so. But in my mind she has been my mentor-and yes, everyone's. When I was thinking of JICA's new head, I just could not think of anyone else but her. It was my decision and some newspapers write that there was some disagreement between the ministry staff and myself on this but that is not the case. I had a list of names. Her name of course was number one on the list. I talked about that list with my people. It was a very quick decision that no one else but she could be the right candidate. We are so grateful that she said yes.

Mr. Belkind: Minister Kawaguchi, I said at the beginning that this is an important day for the FCCJ. Of course it is important having you as Minister of Foreign Affairs here but you have inaugurated a double first: our first Professional Afternoon Tea which might well serve as a format during the coming election period-if the elections are held as everybody anticipates-for more political leaders who like you are oftentimes too busy for more formal events. The message I got back from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was that Minister Kawaguchi wanted as much time as possible for Q&A, and you certainly have done more than we were promised. We are very grateful. I would like to encourage you to keep coming back to the FCCJ as a private member, you might say. I am pleased to present to you a one-year honorary membership and we do hope to see you a lot.