This would be just one more step to Japan and Korea putting the past behind them and hopefully moving forward to a more cooperative future:
This file photo shows a statue of a girl in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul which symbolizes the Korean women sexually enslaved at a young age by Japanese forces. (Yonhap)
Japan’s foreign minister pledged Friday to “swiftly” transfer funds to assist South Korean victims of the country’s colonial-era sexual enslavement, the foreign ministry here said, as the two neighbors ironed out the final details of a deal aimed at ending the decades-old feud over this painful issue.
Seoul’s top diplomat Yun Byung-se and his Japanese counterpart Fumio Kishida held telephone talks earlier in the day before the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced the Japanese decision.
“Foreign Minister Kishida remarked that the Japanese government has decided to disburse the 1 billion yen (US$9.9 million) fund that will come from its government budget as soon as domestic procedures following the deal in December are finalized,” the foreign ministry here said in a statement.
The latest development came amid a delay in Japan’s transfer of the billion yen fund which the country committed to pay in a landmark deal reached with South Korea on Dec. 28 to put an end to the diplomatic feud over the so-called comfort women issue. [Yonhap]
