SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s decision to dissolve a foundation funded by Japan to compensate South Korean women who were forced to work…
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s decision to dissolve a foundation funded by Japan to compensate South Korean women who were forced to work in Japan’s World War II military brothels has thrown fuel on the diplomatic fire between the countries, who share a bitter wartime history.
The announcement Wednesday was predictable as many South Koreans believe that Seoul’s previous conservative government settled for far too less in the 2015 deal, and that Japan still hasn’t acknowledged legal responsibility for atrocities during its colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula from 1910 to 1945.
Japan, meanwhile, is angry that South Korea is effectively walking back on an internationally recognized agreement.
A look at the intensifying dispute between South Korea and Japan:
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THE WOMEN
The women forced to work in the brothels were mainly from Japan and Korea, but also from the Philippines, China, Taiwan, Indonesia and elsewhere in Asia. They were sent to hundreds of front-line brothels called “comfort stations” to provide sex for the Japanese army that invaded and occupied Asian countries from the early 1930s through the end of World War II.
Wartime documents show that Japan’s military supervised the brothels, and set the tariffs, service hours and hygiene standards. Government documents say the purpose was to keep soldiers from raping women and triggering anti-Japan sentiment, as well as preventing venereal disease and Chinese espionage.
Initially, some were professionals or from poor Japanese families, historians say. In South Korea, they were often deceived by local agents who recruited them promising factory work. Later in the war, many minors in the Philippines were kidnapped, raped or tricked into working in the brothels, some victims said.
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JAPAN’S STANCE
Japan’s government has repeatedly denied there was any coercion, and more recently has refused to use the term “sex slave” for the women in English media and U. N. documents.
Japan has intensified its stance in recent years, especially under Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s nationalist government, which says there is no official record showing the wartime government’s systematic use of coercion. Some ultra-right-wing lawmakers say the South Korean women forced to work in the brothels were all prostitutes, and there is increasing bashing of supporters of the survivors, as well as journalists for writing stories about them.
The issue flared in 2014 after a former reporter from Japan’s left-leaning Asahi newspaper was accused of fabricating his report on the first South Korean survivor who came forward, leading to defamation lawsuits still pending in Japan.
