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Moon first filed suit over Mitsubishi’s slave laborers in 2000

Moon first filed suit over Mitsubishi’s slave laborers in 2000

Posted December. 03, 2018 08:11,   

Updated December. 03, 2018 08:11

한국어

With Korea’s Supreme Court having recently issued a ruling that admitted Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries’ liability to pay compensations to Korean slave laborers, the first attorney who filed suit over the case was President Moon Jae-in, it was reported on Sunday.

President Moon first came to be involved in the case because Mitsubishi Heavy Industries’ Korean liaison office was located in Busan at the time in 2000, and because a lawsuit against the company was filed with the Busan District Court. According to the Supreme Court’s legal case search system, Moon, who was a senior staff attorney of a law firm in Busan, submitted a warrant of attorney in person as a member of the legal counsel team for the case on May 2, 2000. Kim Oe-sook, the incumbent Minister of Government Legislation, was also a member of the legal team together with Moon. He continued to be involved in the case until a notice of dismissal as counsel for the case was submitted on November 15, 2006.

Japan has been all the more angered due to the Korean Supreme Court’s ruling over the case in which President Moon had been engaged. One of the reasons is Tokyo’s suspicion about the possibility that the case might have been affected by the Moon Jae-in administration’s denial of the Seoul-Tokyo agreement on comfort women, or Moon’s anti-Japanese stance towards and intention regarding court rulings on Korean slave laborers.


Yoon-Su Kim ys@donga.com · Young-A Soh sya@donga.com