Tag: comfort women

A group of citizens holds a regular Wednesday rally calling for the Japanese government to make an official apology for Japan’s past wrongdoings against women in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul on Oct. 12, 2016. Some 200,000 Asian women, mostly Koreans, were forced to provide sexual services to Japanese soldiers in front-line brothels during World War II. The victims are euphemistically called “comfort women.” (Yonhap)

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:

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]

You can read more at the link.

Very good read over at KoreaBang in regards to the divided opinions Koreans have about the comfort women issue which makes pragmatic decision making involving Japan so difficult:

Was Minister Yoon Byeon-se some sort of a judge in a court? Some comments sound like criticism towards unfair law enforcement, not a negotiation. Was the Korean minister in the position of a judge while the Japanese minister was the accused? Honestly, the meeting wouldn’t even have happened if it weren’t for American pressure. A judge controls how to apply absolute public authority but a negotiator has to give and take. How on earth do you expect Korea to draw an unconditional surrender from Japan? If it was possible at all, why did all those competent presidents and ministers fail to do so?

 

How much leverage do we have against Japan? Economy? Military? The international community’s support? Do we have enough power to deal with Japan’s diplomatic power heads-on? Human rights? Do you know how inconsistent their attention to “human rights” is in the international community who aren’t exactly total angels? Do you think countries like Germany, the U.S. and France would bother confronting Japan because they love human rights so much? Really? For your information, countless political figures such as Merkel, the British crown prince, and Michelle Obama have visited Japan while dust was piling up at the gates of our Blue House. Do you think the world is on our side? For real?

 

I see comments like “It would’ve been better if they hadn’t reached any agreement then.” or “Do your job right.” One of the main complaints about our government was that they seem to be just waiting until all the victims passed away, wasn’t it? Every year about 10 victims pass away now. So what if we keep failing to reach any agreement? Is it better if we don’t negotiate at all then? You ask what right the government has to negotiate on behalf of the victims? Then should the government take a hands-off approach to the comfort women issue? Now will “the Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan” [Jeong-dae-hyeop] handle everything on their own? Some criticize Japan for just throwing a billion yen at the problem. If Japan didn’t decide to pay at all, they would call it an empty apology or worse than the Asian Women’s Fund. Some say it is merely a billion yen. But if Japan decided to pay more, then they would say Japan is trying to bury the issue with money.  [Korea Bang]

Read the whole thing at the link.

Even if the US helped broker a deal between South Korea and Japan, so what?  It is in the US’s as well as Japan’s and the ROK’s national interests to work together when threats like the one posed by the Kim regime a real issue today:

North Korea claimed Monday that the United States pulled strings on a controversial deal between South Korea and Japan over Tokyo’s wartime sex slaves in a bid to strengthen its alliance with the two countries.

In December, Seoul and Tokyo reached a landmark deal to resolve the issue of Japan’s coercion of Korean women into sexual slavery during World War II. But some of surviving South Korean victims accused their government of failing to obtain Japan’s acknowledgment of legal responsibility and rashly reaching the deal without consulting them.

“The U.S. placated South Korea and Japan and forced them to sit in front of a negotiating table over the issue,” the Korean Central News Agency said. “The agreement was reached, masterminded by the White House which is seeking to use the two allies as storm troops for its control over Asia.”

The North’s claim came as the United Nations Security Council is working on a fresh resolution for stronger sanctions against North Korea over its nuclear test on Jan. 6.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

A group of students sleep under vinyl sheets next to a statue erected in front of the Japanese Embassy on Jan. 24, 2016. South Korea experienced the coldest weather this winter on Jan. 24 with temperatures dropping to near record lows. As of 5 a.m., the temperature in Seoul was minus 17 degrees Celsius, while the wind chill was minus 23.8 degrees. Historians estimate more than 200,000 women, mostly Koreans, were forced into sexual slavery at front-line Japanese brothels during World War II. The protest came after Seoul and Tokyo reached an agreement on Dec. 28 on the issue, which sparked a wave of public protests among victims and their supporters, who claim the deal was reached without reflecting the victims’ opinions. (Yonhap)

This would be devestating to ROK-Japan relations if South Korea backs out of this deal.  It seems the Park administration should have expected to the political opposition to come out against the deal and be willing to take the political flak before signing it:

Hundreds of progressive civic groups launched an umbrella organization on Thursday to demand Seoul and Tokyo invalidate the landmark deal over Japan’s sexual enslavement of Korean women.

The umbrella organization, which encompasses 383 civic, religious, lawyers’ and students’ groups as well as 300 individuals, announced its plan to campaign against the deal at home and abroad in a press conference held in central Seoul.

“We gathered here to invalidate the agreement, demand renegotiations with Japan and gather public support,” Kim Geum-ok, a representative for the group, said in the press briefing. “We will be at the forefront of the fight to prevent recurrence of inhumane crimes like sex slavery and win legal compensation and formal apology from Japan.”  [Korea Herald]

You can read much more at the link.

People sleep next to a bronze statue of a girl symbolizing the so-called “comfort women’ issue in front of the site of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul on Jan. 12, 2016, as they stage a sit-in protest to oppose a recent landmark deal between South Korea and Japan over women who were forced to work in Japan’s military brothels during World War II and Japan’s demand that the statue be removed. (Yonhap)

A South Korean citizen offers a flower to the statue of a girl who symbolizes the hundreds of thousands of Korean women who were mobilized as sex slaves for Japan’s World War II soldiers, in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul on Jan. 9, 2016. (Yonhap)

You would think this is something that the Japanese government would try and do on the down low sometime in the future because trying to move this statue now would be political suicide for the ROK government:

Amid an ongoing debate about relocating the statue of a young girl that symbolizes the comfort women – women forced to serve as sex slaves for the Imperial Japanese Army – from in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul, there are indications that the South Korean government is shifting to a stricter legal stance on the issue.This appears to be motivated by concerns about criticism from the South Korean public, which has been increasing since the governments of South Korea and Japan reached an agreement about the comfort women on Dec. 28, as well as by a string of remarks by Japanese Minister for Foreign Affairs Fumio Kishida that treat the removal of the statue as an established fact.

This is likely to provoke further conflict between the governments of South Korea and Japan.“Let me make this clear: The statue of the young girl was set up by private citizens, and there is nothing that the government can do about it,” South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Cho June-hyuk told domestic reporters and foreign correspondents at the regular press briefing on the afternoon of Jan. 5.  [Hankyoreh]

You can read the rest at the link.

This is pretty predictable that the political opposition in South Korea would twist anyway that it could the comfort women agreement between the ROK and Japan to its political advantage:

The main opposition party on Tuesday called on the Seoul government to renegotiate last month’s agreement with Tokyo to settle Japan’s wartime sexual enslavement of Korean women and apologize to victims for the “unilateral” deal.

Four senior lawmakers of the Minjoo Party of Korea including its floor leader Rep. Lee Jong-kul made the demands during their hour-long talks with Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se at his office in Seoul.

The lawmakers also said that Seoul should not accept Tokyo’s contribution of 1 billion yen ($8.38 million) to form a foundation to support the victims, and that the foundation should be funded with civilian donations.

Under the agreement struck on Dec. 28, Japan expressed its apology and contrition for its colonial-era atrocities, and agreed to provide 1 billion yen for the foundation to be established by the Seoul government.

Criticizing the government’s failure to secure consent from the victims for the deal, the lawmakers demanded that President Park Geun-hye and Minister Yun visit each victim and tender an apology for “unilaterally” reaching the agreement.

In response to the lawmakers’ demands, Yun said that the government does not consider any renegotiation given that the agreement was announced before the international community though it is not a formal treaty.  [Korea Herald]

You can read more at the link.