Pyongyang, February 27 (KCNA) -- A hundred and thirty years have passed since Japan forced the feudal government of the Ri Dynasty (1392-1910) to conclude the "Kanghwa Island Treaty" on February 27 (then lunar February 3). This was the first gangster-like and aggressive treaty for occupying Korea and subordinating the Korean nation to Japan.
At that time Japan provoked the aggressive warship "Unyo-maru" incident for the purpose of fabricating the treaty.
After illegally infiltrating into the sea off the Kanghwa Island in September 1875 (lunar August) the horde of pirates of the warship surprised the Chojijin battery on the island and destroyed the batteries on the Jongsan and Yongjong islets. And they set fire to private houses and robbed people of their property. The Korean garrison dealt deserved punishment to the invaders who wantonly violated the sovereignty of the Korean nation.
This notwithstanding, the Japanese imperialists threatened the feudal government of the Ri Dynasty with gunboats, clamoring that the Korean side committed hostile acts against Japan and should compensate her for the damage inflicted on the Unyo-maru and thus forced the latter to conclude the 12-point "Kanghwa Island Treaty" in February 1876.
With this treaty as a pretext, Japan penetrated deep into various fields of Korea including politics, the economy and culture and put the whole of Korea under her military occupation, imposing immeasurable misfortunes and sufferings upon the Korean people for more than 40 years.
It is natural in the light of the international law or in view of moral sense that Japan, the assaulter, sincerely apologizes and compensates to the Korean people, the victim, for her past criminal acts.
Even today, more than sixty years after her surrender at the Second World War, however, Japan refuses to repent of her crime-woven past, trying to justify the history of aggression against Korea.
Moreover, Japan, availing herself of the hostile policy of the United States against the DPRK, is committing every wrongdoing against it and is unscrupulously disclosing the wild ambition for territorial expansion, claiming "dominium over Tok Islet". The Japanese militarist forces should be well aware that the Korean people today are never those yesterday. They are well advised to abandon their wild ambition for the reinvasion of Korea.