Political and trade relations with Japan are a matter of controversy. Gaya may have been a colony or tributary of Wa and Baekje with archaeological evidence suggesting that Gaya polities used to export their products to Kyushu at that time. Japanese scholars argue that Nihonshoki, the first Japanese official chronicle, states that part of Gaya (named "Mimana" also "Kara" in Japanese), along with Baekje and Silla, was a colony or tributary of Japan. The theory is officially denied in Korea.
