The Tokyo High Court put off issuing a ruling Wednesday on a damages suit over unpaid wages filed by kin of four deceased Korean workers who were forced to work at a steel mill in Japan during the war.
Presiding Judge Hiromu Emi canceled the ruling Wednesday because the counsel for the state, the defendant, has demanded the three judges hearing the appeal recuse themselves from the case. The postponement is in line with provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure, the court said.
A new ruling date will be set after a decision is issued on the defense challenge.
The relatives are demanding the state pay 20 million yen in damages for each of the four for unpaid wages.
The government refused in 1997 to pay unpaid wages deposited in 1946 by the steel mill operator at a Justice Ministry bureau in Morioka, Iwate Prefecture, following the deaths of the four in Allied bombings in July 1945.
The government rejected the request on the grounds that a 1965 Japan-South Korea agreement that normalized bilateral diplomatic ties nullifies property claims by South Koreans who were forced to work in wartime Japan.
In October last year, the Tokyo District Court rejected the damages claims.
The four South Koreans were forcibly brought to Japan and made to work at an ironworks in Kamaishi, Iwate Prefecture, of Japan Iron & Steel Co., now known as Nippon Steel Corp., due to a labor shortage in Japan during the war.
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