They say Prime Minister Abe should apologize in person.
For the past 70 years, Korean women once forced to serve the Japanese army as sexual slaves during World War II have demanded justice from the Japanese government.
Now Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe has finally issued a formal apology, but South Korea’s so-called “comfort women” say that true justice remains out of reach.
Abe’s apology accompanied a promise to pay 1 billion yen ($8.3 million) into a fund to provide reparations to the surviving women. The move, which resolves a longstanding dispute between Japan’s and South Korea’s foreign ministries, aims to improve relations between the two countries.
Out of an estimated 200,000 women coerced into serving as comfort women, only a few dozen survive today, according to CNN. The women were primarily drafted in South Korea and forced to serve Japanese troops stationed there. Some women from China and southeast Asia, along with a smaller number of women from Europe and Japan, were also drafted by Japanese units, according to The Guardian.
Abe’s apology accompanied a promise to pay 1 billion yen ($8.3 million) into a fund to provide reparations to the surviving women. The move, which resolves a longstanding dispute between Japan’s and South Korea’s foreign ministries, aims to improve relations between the two countries.
Out of an estimated 200,000 women coerced into serving as comfort women, only a few dozen survive today, according to CNN. The women were primarily drafted in South Korea and forced to serve Japanese troops stationed there. Some women from China and southeast Asia, along with a smaller number of women from Europe and Japan, were also drafted by Japanese units, according to The Guardian.
