Among them are the Mitsubishi Shipyard and the Hashima Coal Mine where more than 57 000 Koreans were forced to do slave labor and met death.

Rodong Sinmun Wednesday in a commentary observes in this regard:

It is illogical to register evidence proving the slave labor sites bearing the bitter grudge of Koreans as world cultural heritages, treasures common to mankind. This move is insult and mockery of human civilization.

This being a hard reality, the Japanese reactionaries shamelessly asserted that their action was taken according to the recommendation made by the UNESCO advisory body and this had nothing to do with the forcible conscription, the commentary says, adding:

The above-said action is little short of the shameless move to distort and deny Japan's past history and embellish the hideous crimes committed by the Japanese imperialists against humanity.

Japan made an application calling for registering as world cultural heritage the suicide note and letter written by a member of the "Kamikaze of the Imperial Japanese Army" preserved in a hall in Kagoshima Prefecture last year.

This is the sinister aim sought by the Japanese reactionaries to cover up the traces of crimes, forced labor and massacre and divert elsewhere the attention of public opinion at home and abroad calling for settlement of the past wrongdoings under the pretext of cultural heritage.

The Japanese reactionaries can never cover up their sinister intention to infuse into all Japanese the venomous idea of militarism by highly praising and propagating their aggression and crimes under the veil of "cultural heritage".