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SKorea urges `courage` from Japan on sex slaves
President Lee Myung-Bak urged Japan on Sunday to have the `courage` to compensate ageing wartime sex slaves before it is too late.
Kyoto: South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak
urged Japan on Sunday to have the "courage" to compensate ageing
wartime sex slaves before it is too late and let the two
nations` relationship progress.
Lee told Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda in Japan`s ancient capital of Kyoto that the issue had prevented their countries from becoming "true partners" in the years since World War II.
Japan, which insists the issue was legally settled four decades ago, promised only that it would "think carefully" from a humanitarian standpoint, but stopped well short of offering a fresh apology, officials said. "South Korea and Japan should become real partners for peace and stability in this region," the visiting South Korean President said.
"And for that to happen, we need to have the courage to resolve as a priority the issue of military comfort women, which has been a stumbling block between our countries," Lee said.
Comfort women, a euphemism used to describe women forced into sexual slavery by Japanese troops before and during World War II, came to widespread notice in the early 1990s when ageing victims went public. A dwindling band of women have since vociferously demanded recompense and an apology from Japan, which imposed a brutal occupation on the Korean peninsula between 1910 and 1945. Last week supporters held their 1,000th weekly protest outside the Japanese embassy in Seoul, unveiling a statue of a young woman in traditional Korean dress who they said represents the thousands of women forced to work in Japan`s military brothels. PTI
Lee told Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda in Japan`s ancient capital of Kyoto that the issue had prevented their countries from becoming "true partners" in the years since World War II.
Japan, which insists the issue was legally settled four decades ago, promised only that it would "think carefully" from a humanitarian standpoint, but stopped well short of offering a fresh apology, officials said. "South Korea and Japan should become real partners for peace and stability in this region," the visiting South Korean President said.
"And for that to happen, we need to have the courage to resolve as a priority the issue of military comfort women, which has been a stumbling block between our countries," Lee said.
Comfort women, a euphemism used to describe women forced into sexual slavery by Japanese troops before and during World War II, came to widespread notice in the early 1990s when ageing victims went public. A dwindling band of women have since vociferously demanded recompense and an apology from Japan, which imposed a brutal occupation on the Korean peninsula between 1910 and 1945. Last week supporters held their 1,000th weekly protest outside the Japanese embassy in Seoul, unveiling a statue of a young woman in traditional Korean dress who they said represents the thousands of women forced to work in Japan`s military brothels. PTI