south korea would call the sea of japan the east sea.
south korea would call the sea of japan the east sea.
who would call the sea of japan the east sea?
south korea
a dispute exists over the international name for the body of water which is bordered by japan, korea (north and south) and russia. 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. the japanese government supports the exclusive use of the name "sea of japan" (日本海), while south korea supports the alternative name "east sea" (), and north korea supports the name "korean east sea" (). 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 intergovernmental organisation, regularly and erroneously cited as being the governing body for the naming of bodies of water around the world, in 2012 decided it was still unable to revise the 1953 version of its publication s-23 - limits of oceans ans seas, which includes only the single name "sea of japan", to include "east sea" together with "sea of japan".
sea of japan naming dispute
from 2003 to 2008, japan conducted a number of surveys of different collections. in 2010, the ministry of foreign affairs (mofa) published their conclusions; they found that among 1,332 maps from the berlin library, 279 used sea of korea, oriental sea, or east sea (or some combination thereof), 579 used sea of japan exclusively, 47 used china sea (with or without other names), 33 used another term, and 384 used no term. mofa said the struck collection (a collection of antiquarian maps owned by a european map collector) showed that out of 79 maps, 35 used sea of japan, 9 used the sea of korea, 2 used oriental sea, and 33 were unmarked. mofa reported that among four russian libraries and document archives holding 51 maps, 29 used sea of japan, 8 used sea of korea, 1 used korea strait, 1 used east sea, 1 used sea of china, and 11 used no name. mofa said that 1,213 maps from the u.s. library of congress, ones that gave a name for this body of water, showed that 87 percent used sea of japan, 8 percent used sea of korea, 5 percent used other terms, and none used oriental sea or east sea. similarly, mofa said that 58 maps from the british library and the university of cambridge showed 86 percent used sea of japan, 14 percent used sea of korea, and none used oriental sea, east sea, or other terms. mofa said that they looked at 1,485 maps in the french national library. they reported that 95 percent of 215 french maps used sea of japan.
sea of japan naming dispute