A statue commemorating so-called comfort women was also put up in Taiwan
People in South Korea and Taiwan unveiled monuments and staged protests on Tuesday to mark Japan’s wartime use of “comfort women”, a euphemism for girls and women forced to work in Japan’s wartime brothels.
In South Korea, a new monument was unveiled as part of its first Memorial Day for Japanese Forces’ Comfort Women Victims, which threatens to exacerbate a sensitive diplomatic issue with Japan.
“My hope is that this issue will not lead to a diplomatic dispute between South Korea and Japan,” said South Korean President Moon Jae-in in a speech marking the occasion. “I also do not think that this will be solved by a bilateral diplomatic solution.”
Moon said the issue involves “the entire world” and human rights of women as a whole.
Japan has said the issue was resolved by a 2015 deal, struck by a previous, conservative South Korean administration, under which Japan apologised to the victims and provided 1 billion yen (US$9.
