Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan says his August apology for Tokyo's past colonial rule of Korea applies to both South and North Korea.

Kan made the comment to a reporter from the Sankei Shimbun.

His remark differs from what Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada said immediately following Kan's speech in August. Okada said the statement doesn't apply to North Korea because Tokyo does not share normalized relations with the communist state.

Okada’s comment was believed to be Japan's stance that an apology for colonial rule will come after diplomatic ties are normalized and historical issues are legally settled with Pyongyang.