The number of ethnic Koreans in Japan acquiring South Korean citizenship is declining after a surge in the 2000s, a government report said over the weekend.

Currently, there are about 700,000 Koreans living in Japan, a legacy of Japan’s colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula from 1910-45. Of them, 500,000 are believed to be pro-South Korea with the remaining 200,000 loyal to North Korea.

Since South Korea and Japan normalized relations in 1965, the number of pro-North Korean Koreans in Japan acquiring South Korean citizenship has been steadily on the rise. The number jumped from 1,629 in 2000 to 10,895 in 2003.

The number, however, plunged to 6,492 in the following year and reached 2,264 in 2010, according to the report complied by the foreign and other concerned ministries.

“In the first seven months of this year, the number of people wanting to become South Korean citizens stood at 982,” it said.

The report gave no reasons for the drop in the number of pro-North Koreans in Japan acquiring South Korean citizenship.

North Korea has no formal diplomatic relations with Japan but it has a strong residents’ group in Japan loyal to it. The group, called Chongryeon, has a well-organized network of schools and cooperative banking services in the country. 

(Yonhap News)