Kono spoke with South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha by phone on Friday.

South Korean plaintiffs in a World War Two forced labour case against Japan's Nippon Steel and Sumitomo Metal Corp have applied to seize some of Nippon Steel's Korean assets, their lawyers said on Wednesday.

Japan has said all wartime reparations were dealt with in a 1965 treaty that normalised ties between the two neighbours.

(Reporting by Elaine Lies and Billy Mallard; Editing by Nick Macfie)