The World Heritage Committee is about to hold its annual meeting in Germany on Sunday. It will decide whether to approve Japan's bid for World Heritage designation for the sites of the Meiji Industrial Revolution. Japan offered its nominations to UNESCO in January 2014, which include 23 sites located in eight prefectures.

South Korea has filed a formal complaint against Japan's bid with President Park Geun-hye raising her concerns to the Director-General of UNESCO Irina Bokova on May 20.

South Korea's opposition comes as people from the Korean Peninsula were forced to work at some of the sites. According to Yun Byung-se, South Korea's foreign minister, Japan's proposed listing is in violation of the World Heritage Convention that protects sites of heritage with "universal human values."

Sunday saw a turnaround, as Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida and Yun agreed during talks in Tokyo that Seoul would no longer oppose Japan's plan to gain the World Heritage status for its industrial revolution sites. Meanwhile, they will cooperate in obtaining World Heritage designation for their candidates. But according to The Asahi Shimbun, South Korea's change resulted from a Japanese compromise.

In fact, some of these industrial revolution sites are more closely related to China. Not only did these old factories force many Chinese to be slave workers, they also engaged in unbridled plunder of China's mineral resources.

Yawata Steel Works, a company located in Fukuoka Prefecture, is a typical example. The state-owned steel mill was partly funded by China's indemnities agreed upon in the Treaty of Shimonoseki and constructed to meet the significant demand from Japan's proliferating infrastructures and armaments industries.

This company, before WWII, was the flagship of Japan's steel industry. The steel mill went into operation in 1901, and during Japan's full-scale aggression, Daye, a major iron mine located in Central China's Hubei Province, was occupied by the Japanese army and heavily exploited to meet the demand of the steel mill.

These sites bear witness to Japan's rapid development and industrialization. However, as for other Asian countries, especially China, which suffered from Japan's invasion during WWII, the memories are different.

What they see in these old factories is Japan's robbery and greed. When Japan and China signed the Treaty of Shimonoseki 120 years ago, Japan seized Taiwan and the Penghu Islands, and was "compensated" with 200 million taels, triple of Japan's annual budget. It is not hard to imagine the great contributions this made to Japan's rise.

Japan was the first modernized Asian country - when its neighbors were still living in huts, it had built skyscrapers. These modern buildings certainly required the wisdom and diligence of the Japanese people, but it must be noted that at the initial stage, the Japanese grabbed basic materials from their neighbors.

That is why although Japan is a highly developed country, its neighbors couldn't grant it full respect.

Trying every possible means to glorify its wartime history, even putting notorious war-related sites on the World Heritage List, Japan lacks a neighborly perspective to review its past. This perspective is essential to Asia's reconciliation over historical issues.

The author is a Chinese scholar living in Japan. opinion@globaltimes.com.cn