South Korea breaks intelligence deal with Japan

South Korea and Japan will no longer share information about the North Korean nuclear threat. A 2016 intelligence pact between the two countries was due for renewal Saturday, but South Korea said Thursday it is scrapping the deal. A longstanding feud between the two nations recently flared up, leading to a breakdown in cooperation between two of the United States’ most important allies in the region.

What are the countries fighting about? South Korea still holds a grudge against Japan for its pre–World War II colonization of the Korean Peninsula. Tensions peaked again last year when South Korea’s highest court ordered Japanese companies to compensate wartime forced laborers. Japan retaliated with a curb on the export of high-tech materials used in memory chips and smartphones to South Korea and the withdrawal of South Korea’s fast-track export status.

Dig deeper: The South China Morning Post explains the many ways Japanese colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula still affects their societies to this day.