The vice foreign ministers of South Korea and Japan held two-and-a-half-hour marathon talks to discuss ways to resolve the issue of compensation for Korean victims of Japan's wartime forced labor.

First vice foreign minister Cho Hyun-dong and his Japanese counterpart Takeo Mori met on Monday in Washington, where both were attending a trilateral meeting with U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman.

While the two sides reportedly focused on Seoul’s proposal for a Korean public foundation to pay the compensation and a sincere response from Tokyo, Cho said after the meeting that they continue to seek common ground.

Declining to elaborate further, the vice minister said Tokyo is likewise very sensitive about the discussions and closely monitoring related reports by South Korean media outlets.

He added that the matter could be further discussed between the two countries' foreign ministers on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference(MSC) later this week.

Regarding Japan's planned release of radioactive water from the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant into the ocean, Cho conveyed Seoul's scientific concerns and urged Tokyo to make further efforts to mitigate them.