Why do Koreans hate Japan?

 Koreans have a particularly bad feeling for Japan. In the field of sports, especially the Korea-Japan soccer match is like a war that must be won. This feeling is worse than the bad feeling that the Japanese have in Korea, and there is a historical reason for this.

More than 100 years ago, Japan forcibly colonized Korea. At that time, the world situation was a period when imperialist countries colonized and exploited other countries, so Japan's colonial rule of Korea was particularly vicious and severe.

The Japanese colonial period refers to the period during which the Korean Peninsula was annexed to the Japanese Empire from August 29, 1910 to August 15, 1945. The Japanese colonial period continues for about 35 years when modern and contemporary Korean history is divided by period in Korean history. After the annexation of Korea and Japan in 1910, colonization took place in the form of the governor and governor-general ruling under the order of the emperor through the Japanese Government-General of Korea, and the political and diplomatic authority of the Korean Peninsula was entirely Japanese.

During this period, Japan murdered, imprisoned and tortured Korean queens, banned the use of Korean words and writings, and killed, imprisoned, and tortured many civilians seeking peaceful independence.

Japan forcibly recruited numerous Koreans to win the Pacific War and gave them hardship, and this was not enough, making many Korean women into war sexual slavery, causing pain.

The reason why Koreans are even more angry is that Japan has never apologized or reflected on these past atrocities. In particular, Japan distorts the history of the past and teaches students as if Japan's colonial rule of Korea was justified.

This is a huge difference compared to Germany and France, who experienced World War II in the past, jointly creating textbooks to reflect on past mistakes and prevent such incidents from happening again.

However, it is important to note that Koreans do not hate the Japanese, but they are against Japanese politicians and administrators who have not reflected on their past mistakes and are still obsessed with militaristic ideas.

For the sake of desirable future relations between Korea and Japan, Japan should clearly apologize and reflect on past mistakes to the international community.