SNU has appointed Kazuhiko Kimijima, now teaching modern East Asian history at Tokyo Gakugei University, as a professor of history education.
 
Kimijima is well known here for his conviction that the Dokdo Islets belong to Korea, not Japan. When the Japanese Education Ministry in July last year published teachers' guidelines that insisted on Japanese territorial rights over Dokdo, Kimijima in the Asahi Shimbun called for their revision. And in 2007, when then-Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe claimed there was no evidence that the Imperial Army conscripted women into sexual slavery during World War II, Kimijima said it was an established fact that the military itself rounded up the"comfort women" and said trying to dodge the responsibility was wrong.

Song Jin-woong, the Vice Dean of Academic Affairs at College of Education, said the University decided to hire Kimijima because he has done a great deal of work with Korean academics on the history of the two countries and expressed a wish to carry out research in Korea. Kimijima will teach from next month until August 2010, when he reaches retirement age.

Feb.13, 2009
SNU PR Office