Photo: Screenshot from website

After some South Korean politicians and media reports hyped the closure of two historic sites in northeast China, the Global Times on Monday learned from staffers at the sites that the closure is only temporary so that repairs can be done.

A staffer at the birthplace of Yun Dong-ju, which is located in Mingdong village, Longjing city in Northeast China's Jilin Province, told the Global Times that one of the buildings is at risk of collapse and needs to be repaired.

A member of staff at the Ahn Jung-geun exhibition hall, which is located in the Lushun Prison Museum in the city of Dalian in Northeast China's Liaoning Province, also told the Global Times that several exhibition rooms have been closed recently due to leaks after heavy rain.

Yun (1917-1945) was an ethnically Korean Chinese patriotic poet. He took part in the struggle for independence against Japanese imperialism when both the Korean Peninsula and northeast China were under Japanese occupation. In 2012, authorities in Mingdong village converted the poet's ancestral home into a tourist attraction.  

Ahn Jung-geun was a Korean freedom fighter. In 1909, he shot and killed Ito Hirobumi, Japan's first prime minister and its top official in Japanese-occupied Korea, at the railway station in Harbin.

Some South Korean politicians and media reports claimed that the closure was a result of worsened China-South Korea relations and that it reflected China's dissatisfaction over the closer US-Japan-South Korea ties. Experts dismissed such provocative claims, saying they are making trouble out of nothing. 

"By deliberately connecting the repairs, which are normal at any museum, to bilateral relations, some people are trying to provoke anger toward China," Lü Chao, an expert on Korean Peninsula issues at the Liaoning Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Monday.

Lü said the Chinese people highly respect and honor the patriotic behavior of both Yun Dong-ju and Ahn Jung-geun, and this respect has not changed at all.

On Sunday, South Korea's Foreign Ministry said it noted the closure of the two historic sites, saying it will get involved with the relevant agencies and cooperate with China on the issue.