SEOUL — Even for a high-profile interview in a widely-read media, it was a high-stakes query.
In a uncommon trade, Hong Seok-hyun, chairman of the Joongang Ilbo, South Korea’s second-largest newspaper, waited until the top of an unique interview earlier than posing it to Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, host of the three-day Group of Seven industrial nations summit that kicks off formally in Hiroshima on Friday.
“In Korea, there is a view that the United States agrees with [South Korean] membership in the G-7, and the effective creation of a new G-8, but that this is opposed by Japan,” the Korean magnate mentioned to the Japanese premier. “What can you say about this perception?”
“The G-7 has never discussed membership expansion,” Mr. Kishida responded. “It is not true that the United States is in favor of Korea joining, or that Japan opposes it.”
The G-7 — the U.S., Canada, France, Britain, Germany, Italy and Japan — is broadly thought-about one of many world’s extra unique political golf equipment, and the potential of South Korea getting a seat on the desk is prompting pressing however hushed debate in Seoul espresso retailers – and past.
Supporters say there are compelling arguments for Seoul’s inclusion, which might be the primary change within the G-7’s lineup since Russia was expelled from the then-G-8 following its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea in 2014. In phrases of its democratic stability, financial clout, technological acumen, very good infrastructure and well-educated citizenry, South Korea ticks each field.
Moreover, South Korea, which its international minister dubs a “global pivotal state,” or GPS, is central to international provide chains in superior semiconductors, computer systems shows, gadgets, auto elements and more and more, NATO-standard weaponry.
South Korean soil offers American GIs a foothold on continental Asia, and a ahead protection bulwark for Japan, U.S. Pacific territories and continental America.
It can also be a diplomatic “GPS.” Former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Canadian Premier Justin Trudeau visited Seoul this week. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will go to after the summit concludes.
Seeking steadiness
Increased Asian presence on the G-7 appears to be like fascinating as democracies on Eurasia’s western and japanese flanks search to current a united entrance towards continental powers China and Russia.
Today’s G-7 is Atlantic-heavy, Indo-Pacific-light, and optically old-school. Its solely non-Western, non-Christian-majority member is Japan.
Competing blocs look extra inclusive than the G-7. The BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (which incorporates Pakistan, China, Russia and numerous Central Asian states, plus observer nations together with Iran) provide much more racial and spiritual range.
The G-7, based in 1973 has no headquarters, secretariat or formal mission. Since expelling Russia in 2014, it has develop into a grouping of affluent, liberal democracies.
South Korea was invited as an observer on the final G-7 leaders’ summit in Cornwall, UK in 2021, and will probably be once more in Hiroshima. South Korea is already a member of a slew of official international our bodies and groupings, together with APEC, OECD, the World Health Organization and the Word Trade Organization.
But on the precept that one waits to be requested to affix essentially the most unique golf equipment, Seoul officialdom is preserving mum.
“We are not actively pushing this agenda officially, but many in government think Korea is ready, if it is called by the members,” mentioned Park Cheol-hee, chancellor of the Korean Diplomatic Academy. “We are not promoting the idea, just supporting the idea.”
“I have been in discussions with some government people with reasonably informed thoughts, and it is really, really sensitive,” added Mason Richey, who teaches worldwide relations at Seoul’s Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. “In the lead-up to the summit, they are extremely cautious.”
But some non-official proponents haven’t been so shy within the run-up to Hiroshima.
Jongsoo Lee, a Pacific Forum fellow, in February penned a piece in The National Interest entitled, “The Case for South Korean membership in the G-7,” arguing that Seoul is “the logical new G-8 member from the Indo-Pacific because, next to Japan, it is the largest and wealthiest free-market democracy in Asia.”
On March 13, Voice of America’s Korean-language service canvassed former U.S. ambassadors to South Korea. Unsurprisingly, all had been in favor.
Questioning enlargement
But whereas South Koreans, Korean-Americans and Korea-friendly diplomats bang the gong, impartial analysts say there are drawbacks to South Korea’s utility. Ironically, the G-7’s solely Asian member — Japan — could also be disinclined to welcome a fellow Asian in.
As the Joongang interview laid naked, it’s broadly alleged in South Korean media that Tokyo needs to maintain Seoul at bay, given the dire relations that prevailed between the late conservative Japanese Premier Shinzo Abe and Korea’s former liberal President Moon Jae-in.
Conservative President Yoon Suk Yeol succeeded Mr. Moon in 2022 and has bent over backwards to rebuild ties with Tokyo. But some imagine Japan stays cautious, given how sharply bilateral relations have fluctuated underneath totally different Seoul administrations.
“Japan won’t squander this – Kishida has spoken out on a new era for bilateral relations,” mentioned Haruko Satoh, a global relations skilled at Osaka University. “But I think he is apprehensive, I think the Japanese want to wait it out a bit.”
Welcoming South Korea with G-7 membership makes extra sense for Washington, analysts say. It would empower Mr. Yoon, who has courted native unpopularity so as to increase ties with outdated enemy Japan and breathe new power into South Korea-Japan-U.S. trilateral cooperation.
“It’d be nice to give some clap back to the Yoon administration,” mentioned Robert Kelly, a political scientist at Pusan National University. “I’ve heard that Biden’s people think the Japanese have not really come round.”
Mr. Richey agrees.
“If you wrap Yoon’s personal courage into the larger bow of Korea being an important country with growing economic and military weight, this potential can be harnessed by giving it a bigger platform,” he mentioned. “That would be a legacy-making move and I think that would instantly turn around [South Korean] public opinion on the Japan deal.”
But it’s broadly understood that the extra the G-7 expands, the extra unwieldy it will get. “If you let in every Tom, Dick and Harry you dilute some of your prestige, and it becomes hard to make decisions,” mentioned Mr. Richey. “That is just a fact of geopolitics.”
Mr. Kelly notes that the variety of everlasting, veto-wielding members of the U.N. Security Council has remained at 5 greater than seven a long time after the world physique was based.
“It has always been frozen because once you open that door, you get all kinds of claimants with all kinds of compelling arguments,” he mentioned.
Other nations with potential G-7 claims embody Australia, Brazil, India and Indonesia, specialists say. Regardless, any discuss enlargement will be behind closed doorways.
“It is not an open discussion, or a recruiting decision,” mentioned Mr. Park. “They will have to have an internal debate.”
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