TOKYO, June 13 (UPI) -- Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi faces growing pressure to impose sanctions on North Korea, the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper reported Monday.
Members of Koizumi's ruling Liberal Democratic Party, the New Komeito Party and the Democratic Party of Japan, all "stressed they were ready to impose the sanctions as they believed a hard-line approach would win concessions from North Korea," the paper said.
Koizumi by contrast stated at his recent summit meeting with North Korean leaders that "as long as North Korea observed the Japan-North Korea Pyongyang Declaration, Japan would not impose sanctions," Yomiuri Shimbun said.
However, Kenichi Mizuno, an LDP member in the House of Representatives, the main chamber of the Japanese parliament, said the prime minister should be prepared to impose sanctions.
"The government should base its negotiations with North Korea on the assumption that the lawmakers did not intend to give the government a tool that would not be used," he said.
