ABSTRACT
On 1 February 2004, the head of the Mukuge Group, Lee Kyung-jae, organized and chaired a meeting in Tokyo that dealt with an increasingly important issue for zainichi Koreans.1 The issue discussed was the right of zainichi to acquire Japanese citizenship free from its association with assimilation. The group also expressed a desire for open discussion on naturalization instead of its status as a taboo topic (Committee for Establishing the Right for Zainichi Koreans to Hold Japanese Nationality 2004). Moreover, the group stressed the importance of retaining Korean ethnic and cultural roots when deciding to naturalize and suggested that using the term ‘Korean-Japanese’ (koriakei nihonjin) was a step in the direction towards ‘multicultural coexistence’ (tabunka kyo¯sei) in Japan.
