"Sea of Japan" & "East Sea" Dispute Reaches This Blog

Above, a view of the Sea of Japan (or East Sea) from Niigata, Japan. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

This morning, I received the following email from a reader in South Korea:

Dear Sir / Madam, 

My name is Sophia.

While seeing your webpage, I found a certain sea name which I would like to explain about.

At this linked web pages (http://armandsrancho.blogspot.kr/2010_11_01_archive.html) the map showed the name “Sea of Japan”. Concerning this appellation for the sea area, I would great appreciate if you could take using two names, i.e. Sea of Japan and East Sea into consideration.

As the Republic of Korea and Japan currently use different names for the sea area, it would appropriate to use both names used by each country.

The resolutions of international organizations recommend that when countries sharing a given geographical feature fail to agree on a common name, competing names should be concurrently used. (the International Hydrographic Organization Resolution 1/1972, the United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names Resolution III/20, etc.)

Also, an increasing number of the world’s prominent mapmakers, newspapers, publications, and mass media outlets are recognizing these facts and evidence. National Geographic, The Times Books, Le Figaro, The Economist, and CNN, use the dual name of “East Sea” and “Sea of Japan” in their maps and publications.

Historically, the sea area in question has been called the "East Sea" in Korea for the past two thousand years. Numerous literary and geographic works also show that the name “East Sea” has been closely connected to the daily lives of Korean people for a long time. As the naming issue cannot be separated from history, culture and identity of a nation, when it comes to a name for any geographical feature, the views of countries directly concerned should be fully respected.

After receiving this, I checked around and the most definitive word on the dispute over the naming of the Sea of Japan or East Sea was from Wikipedia.

There, it is noted:

The international name for the body of water which is bordered by Japan, North Korea, Russia, and South Korea is disputed. In 1992, objections to the name Sea of Japan were first raised by North Korea and South Korea at the Sixth United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names.^[1] The Japanese government supports the use of the name "Sea of Japan", while South Korea supports the name "East Sea", and North Korea supports the name "East Sea of Korea". Currently, most international maps and documents use either the name Sea of Japan (or equivalent translation) by itself, or include both the name Sea of Japan and East Sea, often with East Sea listed in parentheses or otherwise marked as a secondary name. The International Hydrographic Organization, the international governing body for the naming of bodies of water around the world, in 2012 decided not to change the current single name "Sea of Japan" rejecting the South Korea's request to use "East Sea" together with "Sea of Japan".^[2][3][4][5]

The issue will be taken up again in 2017 by the IHO. I personally have no position on this dispute. I agree with those who have said that South Korea and Japan should be the ones to work this dispute out.