"Japan will not provide any assistance to North Korea, until the issue of abductees, including a teenage girl abducted at the age of 13, is resolved. However, in order to resolve it, prime minister Abe plans to break a hard shell and one day meet with Chairman Kim Jong Un. In the future, a question of normalizing relations between Pyongyang and Tokyo with keeping the nuclear and missile problem in mind will come up," Taniguchi said.
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The Japanese government officially confirmed 17 abduction cases of its nationals, including 13-year-old girl Megumi Yokota, between the 1970s and 1980s, while hundreds more disappeared under the circumstances that could potentially involve North Korea's actions.
Pyongyang recognized only 13 instances of kidnapping Japanese citizens, five of whom were returned to Japan and eight more died. It is believed that some of these Japanese citizens were abducted for the purpose of obtaining their identities, which were used by North Korean penetration agents in South Korea. Other abducted individuals allegedly taught the Japanese language to North Korean intelligence personnel.