Koizumi slams N Korea, then backtracks

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi was reported to have called North Korea ‘‘unpardonable’’ on Monday for abducti...

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi was reported to have called North Korea ‘‘unpardonable’’ on Monday for abducting and killing Japanese citizens but he later said he had only been stating views held by others.

Koizumi’s reported comments came a day before five Japanese nationals who were spirited away by North Korean agents in the 1970s were due to return to Japan for a short visit.

‘‘North Korea is an unpardonable country. It kidnaps, abducts and kills Japanese,’’ Koizumi was quoted by Kyodo news agency as saying in a stump speech in northern Japan. But Koizumi later said that while using these words he had simply been describing views held by others. ‘‘There are people who say that,’’ Koizumi was quoted as saying.

In his speech, Koizumi, who agreed to resume talks on forging diplomatic ties in a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il in Pyongyang last month, had also stressed the importance of negotiating with the secretive state.

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