He added that “various other situations” had been considered in making the decision.

Hirohisa Soma, the deputy head of the Japanese embassy in Seoul, reportedly ridiculed Moon’s chances of holding a meeting with Suga during the Games, accusing the South Korean president of “masturbating”.

In response, South Korea’s First Vice-Foreign Minister Choi Jong-kun summoned Japanese ambassador Koichi Aiboshi to the foreign ministry to express its “grave” regret and lodge a protest over Soma’s “undiplomatic and rude” remarks.

The top Japanese government spokesman, Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato, on Monday said Soma’s remarks were “very inappropriate as a diplomat, no matter in what circumstances these remarks were made”.

Kato also said the episode was “very regrettable”, indicating Soma would be assigned out of Seoul.

South Korea summons Japanese ambassador after diplomat’s crude remarks

Opinion polls conducted before Soma’s gaffe showed that at least two out of three South Koreans were opposed to Moon travelling to Tokyo for Friday’s opening ceremony.

The Blue House had made it clear that the president would visit only if there was an opportunity for an extended summit with Suga, giving the two leaders a chance to address fraught relations between their countries.

But Japanese media reported that Suga only plans to meet leaders attending the opening ceremony for about 15 minutes each.

Seoul reportedly wants to start negotiations to address long-standing disputes over legacies from Japan’s colonial past and Tokyo’s unilateral export curbs launched in 2019.

Ties between the countries have been strained by disputes over issues stemming from World War II and the period of Japanese colonial rule, including forced labour and the use of sex slaves, as well as Tokyo’s recent decision to impose export restrictions.

Tokyo also recently refused to amend an Olympic torch relay map marking a cluster of disputed islets – known as Dokdo in South Korea, which controls them, and Takeshima in Japan – as Japanese territory.

In contrast, South Korea had to drop the Dokdo islets from the Korean Unification flag it used during the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics under pressure from the International Olympic Committee.

“This episode illustrates how difficult it is to mend fences with each other,” said Yoon Sung-suk, a political-science professor at Chonnam National University in South Korea.

Japan feels little need to give Moon a boost in his last year in office by yielding to Seoul’s demand for the lifting of trade restrictions and the start of negotiations on the compensation issues as it “looks askance at the liberal Moon government”, Yoon said.

“The conservative-dominated Japan has basically no warm feelings towards Moon. It has a doubtful attitude toward his policy of seeking reconciliation with the North and avoiding alienating China.”

Speculation of Moon, Suga summit at Tokyo Olympics mounts

Go Myong-hyun at the Seoul-based Asan Institute for Policy Studies said Soma’s faux pas turned out to be “fatal” to Moon’s hoped-for visit to Japan as bilateral ties had already been badly frayed.

“For President Moon, it was too risky for him to visit Japan with no guarantees that he would not return home empty-handed, which would make him appear worse in the eyes of his supporters,” Go said. “Seoul can also say to Washington; You see? We did our best to mend fences with Japan.”

US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman is currently visiting Japan, where she will be joined by her Japanese and South Korean counterparts to discuss trilateral cooperation on pressing shared challenges, including regional security issues such as North Korea, the US State Department said.

Sherman will arrive in Seoul on Wednesday for a three-day visit to hold talks on strengthening coordination on the Korean peninsula, as well as regional and global challenges, the South Korean foreign ministry said.