Photo/Illutration Prime Minister Fumio Kishida speaks with reporters on Oct. 6 after his phone conversation with South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol. (Koichi Ueda)

North Korea has unintentionally given the leaders of Japan and South Korea something they can finally agree on: strengthening cooperation with each other and the United States on national security matters.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol spoke for about 25 minutes by phone on Oct. 6 after North Korea launched two ballistic missiles that landed in the Sea of Japan.

“When thinking about the North Korea issue, it will be important to develop Japan-South Korea ties in a future-oriented manner,” Kishida told reporters after the call.

According to the South Korean presidential office, the two leaders also agreed on the need to send a clear message to North Korea that provocations will come at a cost.

Bilateral ties have long been strained and worsened following South Korean Supreme Court rulings that ordered Japanese companies to compensate wartime Korean laborers.

Since he took office in May, Yoon has shown he is willing to improve bilateral ties and South Korea has also shown more enthusiasm about national security cooperation with both Japan and the United States.

A high-ranking Japanese Foreign Ministry official said that it is an about-face from the hard-line stance taken by Yoon’s predecessor, Moon Jae-in.

By comparison, Moon and then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe spoke on the phone in September 2017 when North Korea launched two ballistic missiles over Japan, but no cooperation ensued on national security matters.

However, after North Korea launched missiles on Oct. 6, Japan, the United States and South Korea conducted a training exercise that included intelligence sharing related to ballistic missiles.

A high-ranking Foreign Ministry official said the frequency and level of intelligence shared with South Korea has increased immensely since Moon.

Sources in the prime minister’s office said Japan requested the phone call with South Korea. The move was likely made because of the likelihood that North Korea will conduct nuclear tests in the near future.

A Foreign Ministry official said Japan’s national security depends on maintaining a positive relationship with South Korea.

Officials have insisted it is up to Seoul to make the first move in trying to resolve the issue related to Korean wartime laborers.

But low support ratings for the Yoon administration have hampered what he can do to improve ties with Japan.

(This article was written by Taro Kotegawa, Keishi Nishimura and Yuichi Nobira in Tokyo and Takuya Suzuki and Kiyohide Inada in Seoul.)

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