Dokdo islets. Photo: www.koreaaward.com

South Korea has protested Japan’s reiteration of its claim to the disputed islets called Dokdo and known as Takeshima in Japanese in a defense white paper published yesterday. South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman Cho Tai-young said Seoul strongly protests Japan's territorial claims to Dokdo, urging Tokyo to remove its claim from the white paper and avoid the recurrence of this act. The ministry called in Kurai Takas, a senior Japanese diplomat from the Japanese Embassy, and lodged the protest with him.