The North Koreans have to be loving this:

Japan and North Korea kick off their first full-fledged talks in more than three years on Thursday seeking to resolve long-standing disputes that have blocked the Asian neighbours from establishing diplomatic ties… The Beijing meetings would be the first comprehensive talks between Japan and North Korea since October 2002… Tokyo has offered full-scale financial aid to impoverished North Korea, but only after diplomatic ties are forged…

Japan gave South Korea $500 million when the two countries normalised ties in 1965, and some analysts have said Tokyo could provide up to $10 billion… [Japan will] use the Beijing talks to press Pyongyang to resolve the thorny issue of Japanese citizens it kidnapped in the 1970s and 1980s to train spies… North Korea has admitted abducting 13 people, five of whom have returned to Japan with their children. Pyongyang says the other eight are dead. (emphasis added)

Meanwhile in the South:

One day before leaving on a visit to Japan, South Korea’s foreign minister has suggested his country may scale back its ties with Tokyo. South Korea is angry over what it views as Japan’s continued glorification of its wartime past. However, officials say Seoul will still work closely with Tokyo on multilateral issues… Mr. Ban told reporters it may be worth making a distinction between South Korea’s one-on-one relationship with Japan, and its cooperation on issues of multinational concern… Seoul says Tokyo has not done enough to apologize or compensate for atrocities it committed during its 35 years of colonial rule over Korea in the first half of the 20th century. They say Japan continues to sanitize and even glorify its wartime past in school textbooks. (emphasis added)

Trying to create a distinction between what policies actually are and what you’d like some other country to think of them didn’t work too well with the U.S., so good luck with trying to fool the Japanese. While I don’t think it’s in good taste for Japan to glorify their war criminals, it is their country, and South Korea cannot dictate what they can or cannot do. And does Japan even care in PM Ban or President Roh ever visit them or not? I’ll guess not.

I should be clear that while the DPRK is talking to Japan, a major breakthrough is not expected unless things go well in the Six-Party Talks. The North did get close in 2002, but it will be much harder to convince Japan this time.