SKorea, Japan to resume annual friendlies

South Korea’s football body announced it has accepted Japan’s proposal to resume annual friendly matches this year after an 18-year lapse.

The Korean Football Association (KFA) said the first friendly was slated to be held in Tokyo around October and the second sometime next year in Seoul.

“Our association has accepted Japan’s proposal to resume A matches between the two countries, which stopped in 1991,” KFA spokesman You Young-Cheul told AFP.

“It was a conditional agreement. Regular friendlies will take place only if both advance to the 2010 World Cup finals,” he said.

South Korea is in top position in the second group of the Asian qualifying round, while Japan is runner-up in the first group after Australia.

You said there were several reasons including politics for the 18-year gap.

“We hope the resumption of regular friendlies will help the two countries improve relations,” he said.

Relations have often been strained by territorial disputes and lingering bitterness at Japan’s harsh 1910-1945 rule over Korea.

In January South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak and Japan’s Prime Minister Taro Aso agreed to develop a “future-oriented, mature partnership.”