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SEOUL—South Korea and Japan on Monday said they reached an agreement on Korean “comfort women” who were forced to serve Japanese soldiers sexually in World War II.
Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida said the agreement includes support services for the women, using Japanese government funds. An earlier Japanese arrangement to help the women in the 1990s and 2000s involved the use of private donations.
Mr. Kishida said Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expressed his apologies and remorse to the women as part of the agreement.
Mr. Kishida said the agreement represents a “final, irrevocable” settlement of the issues. “I believe that Japanese-Korean relations will enter a new era,” he Kishida said.
In 1993, Japan issued a statement extending its “sincere apologies and remorse” to the women. South Korea has called for direct support for the women.
“Comfort women” is a euphemism for women used by the imperial Japanese military as forced prostitutes for troops during Japan’s military expansion in Asia beginning in the 1930s. There are no reliable records on how many women were involved, but mainstream historians’ estimates range from 20,000 to 200,000. Many were from Korea, then a Japanese colony, as well as other Asian nations, in addition to a few Westerners.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/japan-south-korea-reach-comfort-women-agreement-1451286347