‘Comfort women’ row heats up over review
Print Edition
Japan will review the testimony of South Korean women who were forced to work in wartime brothels, a senior official said yesterday, but he gave no indication whether Tokyo might water down a 1993 apology on the issue that has long caused friction with its neighbors.
The possibility of a revision to the landmark apology, known as the Kono Statement, drew outrage from South Korea and China, from where many of the “comfort women,” as the women who served in the brothels are known in Japan, were forced to work in the brothels.
The move comes as remarks on the wartime past by aides to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe raise concerns about his increasingly conservative agenda, aimed at bolstering the military and recasting history with a less apologetic tone.
Japan’s ties with South Korea are frayed by a territorial row and the legacy of its 1910-1945 colonization of the Korean Peninsula, including the question of compensation and an apology to women forced to serve in military brothels in World War II.
In 1993, then Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono issued a statement recognizing the involvement of military authorities in the brothel system and apologizing for the women’s suffering.
The statement was based in part on the testimony of 16 South Korean women who had served in the brothels.
Current Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga repeated yesterday that the government would re-examine the women’s testimony. But he sidestepped a direct reply when asked whether this might lead to a revision of the Kono statement.
“We will review their testimony,” Suga told a news conference after being asked repeatedly about the issue.
He initially promised a re-examination of the women’s testimony on Thursday in comments to a parliamentary committee.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry denounced the system of “comfort women” as a serious “crime against humanity.”
“Any attempt by Japan to deny this crime and any move attempting to overturn the case of the history of invasion would be met with strong opposition from both the majority of the victims from countries and the international community,” spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a news briefing in Beijing.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
