De facto N Korean embassy in Japan to stay put

Why any company would want to lease a building to these North Koreans who were so in debt that they were forced to auction their own building off is beyond me.

@Amidalism: Why not, if the company is owned by north korean or has interest in north korea! They have been here long enough to open a company. Legally Japan government can not do much to stop it.

Hundreds of thousands of ethnic Koreans live in Japan, mostly a legacy of those who emigrated or were forced to move to Japan during its 1910-1945 colonial rule of the Korean peninsula.

So why doesn't Japan buy the site and sign it over to DPRK in perpetuity? No remorse?

So why doesn't Japan buy the site and sign it over to DPRK in perpetuity? No remorse?

Because the usual AFP's copy/paste ad nauseum narrative is incorrect. Koreans at no time were "forced to move to Japan" by the Japanese government except for the work draft order issued to Koreans in September of 1944. However, those who remained in Japan accounted a grand total of only 245 people per the government survey conducted in 1959.

https://www.sanae.gr.jp/column_details415.html

nigelboy: However, those who remained in Japan accounted a grand total of only 245 people per the government survey conducted in 1959.

245's a big difference from the plot shown in wikipedia, which peaks at just under 2M in 1945, and drops to around 600K after that, in the chart titled "Registered Korean residents in Japan". The datapoint for 1959 is just above 600K.

A "government survey conducted in 1959" may not have been very complete. Given the very low count, it may even have counted only Koreans using Korean names in a country where they were required to adopt Japanese names, or maybe only counted Koreans on their immediately-post-WWII holiday, or nigelboy accidentally dropped a K, or something.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Population_of_Koreans_in_Japan.gif

Chart: Registered Korean residents in Japan

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koreans_in_Japan#During_World_War_II

In 1939, labor shortages due to World War II led to organised official recruitment of Koreans to work in mainland Japan, initially through civilian agents, and later directly, often involving elements of coercion or deception.[citation needed] In 1944, the Japanese authorities extended the mobilization of Japanese civilians for labor to the Korean peninsula. Of the 5,400,000 Koreans conscripted, about 670,000 were taken to mainland Japan (including Karafuto Prefecture (present-day Sakhalin, now part of Russia)) for civilian labor. Those who were brought to Japan were forced to work in factories, in mines and as laborers, often under appalling conditions. Koreans were better treated than were laborers from other countries, but about 60,000 are estimated to have died between 1939 and 1945.[6] Most of the wartime laborers went home after the war ...

245's a big difference from the plot shown in wikipedia, which peaks at just under 2M in 1945, and drops to around 600K after that, in the chart titled "Registered Korean residents in Japan". The datapoint for 1959 is just above 600K.

Of course there is since the occupation by the GHQ, the Koreans in Japan were sent back to Korea.

I think you are confused. What the link stated was, out of the 611K that remained in Japan, only 245 came to Japan as a result of the 1944 order.

Although the passage by AFP is not incorrect, it gives the impression that most of those who remained in Japan were forced to come to Japan by the government at that time. This is factually incorrect.

The DPRK undoubtedly has reserves of assets that it probably parks with sympathizers. That is what allows Chosen Soren to find people to front organizations that allows it to retain use of its headquarters. We should look at the organization as combination Korean Workers Party front organization, "civic" patriotic organization to keep alive the notion of victimization by Japan (and South Korea), and intelligence/agitprop organization.