South Korea filed an official protest Wednesday over a Japanese prefecture's legislation aimed at boosting its claim to a group of disputed islets located in the East Sea (Sea of Japan). (Photo: Xinhua)

    SEOUL, March 16 (Xinhuanet) -- South Korea filed an official protest Wednesday over a Japanese prefecture's legislation aimed at boosting its claim to a group of disputed islets located in the East Sea (Sea of Japan).

    The row over the islets escalated as Japan's Shimane Prefecture on Wednesday approved a bill designating Feb. 22 of every year as "Takeshima Day." The islets are called "Dokdo" in South Korea and "Takeshima" in Japan.

    Toshinao Urabe, deputy chief of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul, was called in to hear the complaint in a meeting with South Korean Deputy Foreign Minister Song Min-soon, reported the South Korean Yonhap News Agency.

    "Song lodged a strong protest due to the fact that the Shimane Prefecture proceeded to pass the bill despite repeated requests from South Korea that it be withdrawn," an official at the South Korean Foreign Ministry was quoted by Yonhap as saying. "We also demanded the ordinance be scrapped immediately."

    Song also rapped Japan's central government for its "passive" attitude, the official said, referring to the fact that Tokyo did little to defuse the dispute.

    The central government of Japan has largely kept a low profile in the dispute, insisting that it cannot meddle in a local government's affairs.

    It was the second time that Urabe had been called in by the South Korean government over the disputed islets within three weeks. On Feb. 24, Urabe heard the complaint of the South Korean Foreign Ministry about Japanese Ambassador to Seoul Toshiyuki Takano's remarks on the islets.

    Takano said Takeshima "is historically and legally Japan's territory."

    The Japanese ambassador flew back to Tokyo last Sunday and would stay there for about a week.

    South Korea insists that the Dokdo islets have been listed as its territory in history literature since the fifth century. And Seoul has deployed a group of coast police on the island since 1954.

    Meanwhile, Japan also claims that the islets have been its territory since the 17th century, as written in literature.

    On Feb. 22, 1905, the Japanese Shimane Prefecture issued a notice that claimed the islets as part of its land.

    The notice became the backbone of Japan's claim over Dokdo, butSouth Korea says the argument is inefficacious, because it was made when Korea's Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910) was deprived of its diplomacy by Japan.

    Moreover, South Korea points out that the Japanese notice came five years later than an official statement on sovereignty over Dokdo issued by the Joseon Dynasty's last King Gojong.

    Japan started the annexation of the Korean Peninsula in the early 20th century and completed it in 1910. After liberation from Japanese colonial rule in 1945, the first South Korean President Lee Seung-man issued a presidential declaration on the dominion over the coastal sea and sovereignty over Dokdo in January 1952. Enditem