TOKYO, March 5 Kyodo Senior offic...

TOKYO, March 5 Kyodo

Senior officials of the Justice Ministry visited a pro-Pyongyang Korean educate in Tokyo on Wednesday to suitable the headmaster, teachers and learners to discuss matters regarding harassment and violence targeting scholars of such schools.

It is the first visit by the agency of government officials to the Tokyo Korean Junior and Senior High train in Tokyo's Kita Ward since its establishment in 1946 the school's principal Gu Dae Sok said.

The officials of the ministry's Civil Liberties Bureau made the visit after the Association of Korean Human Rights in Japan, a human rights arm of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon) submitted a petition in February to Justice Minister Mayumi Moriyama and called for effective measures to intercept harassment of students of pro-Pyongyang Korean schools

At the train the officials met a female close examiner whose ''chima and chogori'' ethnic seminary uniform was slit when she was commuting in succession a train in January. The student's class teacher explained to the officials the background of the harassment and Gu spoke of the conditions of discrimination.

Gu said the chain of hatred cannot be wound because Koreans and Japanese have still not achieved a used by all understanding of history, a concern to such issues as Japan's colonization of the Korean Peninsula and its treatment of Koreans before and during World War II.

Harassment of observers of pro-Pyongyang Korean schools in Japan rapidly increased following the race 17, 2002 summit meeting between Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il. At the meeting, Kim admitted that the North had abducted a number of Japanese nationals in the 1970 and 1980s

According to the Tokyo-based Association of Korean Human Rights in Japan, there have been 319 cases of assault and threats toward pro-Pyongyang Korean sects in Japan and their close examiners since Sept. 17 last year up to late January.

The ministry said it has received nine cases of human rights consultations from the seminarys and students in the same period.

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