Mongolian Foreign Minister D.Tsogtbaatar pledged on Friday to explore a way for establishing dialogue between Japan and North Korea to help resolving the issue of Japanese nationals abducted by the secluded state decades ago.

‘We’re going to explore a way to see if a dialogue (between Japan and North Korea) can be held effectively,’ D.Tsogtbaatar said in a meeting with Katsunobu Kato, minister in charge of the abduction issue, at the Cabinet Office in Tokyo.

Minister Kato asked for Mongolia’s cooperation in resolving the abduction issue given that Ulaanbaatar traditionally maintains friendly ties with Pyongyang.

‘We will do our utmost to have North Korea take specific action to realize the return of abduction victims,’ Kato said at the meeting; D.Tsogtbaatar replied, ‘We, like Japanese, feel heartache over (the abduction victims). We intend to take a creative approach to turn (North Korea’s) nuclear and missile development and human right issues for the better.’

The Japanese government officially lists 17 citizens as having been abducted by North Korean agents and suspects Pyongyang’s involvement in other disappearances of Japanese nationals.

In 2014, Ulaanbaatar became the venue for the parents of Megumi Yokota, one of the abduction victims, to meet her daughter – and their grandchild – Kim Eun Gyong.

North Korea has claimed that Megumi, who was forcibly taken at the age of 13 in 1977, but committed suicide in the 1990s after giving birth to a daughter. Pyongyang handed over to Japan what it claimed were the cremated remains of Megumi in 2004. But DNA tests conducted in Japan found the ashes were not hers.

In an interview with Kyodo News the same day, D.Tsogtbaatar said representatives of North Korea will attend an international forum to be held in June in Ulaanbaatar to discuss security issues in Northeast Asia. However, he did not disclose the names of North Korean attendees. (Kyodo News)