Japanese holiday ‘celebrating’ disputed islands sparks backlash in South Korea

Web users in both Japan and South Korea are up in arms over Japanese celebrations on Friday of Takeshima Day — a quasi-official holiday designed, appropriately, to mark an old territorial spat between Japan and South Korea.

Takeshima, or Dokdo in Korean, are a string of uninhabited volcanic outcroppings in the Sea of Japan. Both Japan and South Korea claim them, a dispute going back at least 60 years. The holiday, for its part, only goes back six years, when a local Japanese council signed it into law "as hundreds of nationalists sporting paramilitary gear" urged it on.

This year, as in years past, the holiday remains divisive. Japan's central government sent a representative to celebrate in Shimane prefecture for the first time, reports the Wall Street Journal. Some 50 South Korean protesters gathered outside the Japanese Embassy in Seoul, and South Korea's foreign ministry promised to make a formal complaint.

오류표기 :  dokdo를 takeshima로 표기함