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Park calls for fresh ties with Japan over landmark deal on comfort women

December 28, 2015
Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, left, is shown the way by South Korean President Park Geun-hye prior to a meeting at the presidential house in Seoul, South Korea, Monday, Dec. 28, 2015. The foreign ministers of South Korea and Japan said Monday they had reached a deal meant to resolve a decades-long impasse over Korean women forced into Japanese military-run brothels during World War II, a potentially dramatic breakthrough between the Northeast Asian neighbors and rivals. (Chun Jean-hwan/Newsis via AP)

Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, left, is shown the way by South Korean President Park Geun-hye prior to a meeting at the presidential house in Seoul, South Korea, Monday, Dec. 28, 2015. The foreign ministers of South Korea and Japan said Monday they had reached a deal meant to resolve a decades-long impasse over Korean women forced into Japanese military-run brothels during World War II, a potentially dramatic breakthrough between the Northeast Asian neighbors and rivals. (Chun Jean-hwan/Newsis via AP)

SEOUL (Yonhap) — President Park Geun-hye expressed hope Monday that South Korea and Japan will build confidence and start bilateral relations anew based on a landmark deal on the comfort women.

South Korea and Japan “should turn the agreement into a precious opportunity to restore honor and dignity” to the comfort women and heal their scars, Park said in a telephone conversation with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, according to Cheong Wa Dae, South Korea’s presidential office.

In the 13-minute conversation, Abe also expressed an apology and repentance from the heart to all those who as comfort women experienced much pain and bore scars that are difficult to heal on their bodies and souls.

The phone conversation came hours after South Korea and Japan produced a deal that could end the longstanding dispute over Korean women forced into sexual slavery for Japanese soldiers during World War II — one of the thorniest diplomatic issues between the two neighbors.

The deal centered on Japan’s admission of responsibility for the wartime crime and plans to pay reparations to the former Korean sex slaves.

Under the deal, Japan agreed to offer 1 billion yen (US$8.3 million) in reparations to the victims through a fund to be created by the South Korean government.

South Korea vowed to end the dispute once and for all if Japan fulfills its responsibilities. It also agreed to work on addressing Tokyo’s demands that the statue of a girl symbolizing comfort women be removed from outside the Japanese Embassy in Seoul.

Abe also told Park that Japan will faithfully carry out a project to restore the honor and dignity of comfort women and soothe their scars, noting the deal is the final solution to the issue of comfort women and it is irreversible.

South Korea and Japan are close economic partners and key allies of the United States, though they have long been in conflict over territory and other historical disputes stemming from Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula from 1910-45.

Park and Abe also agreed to closely cooperate on the improvement and development of bilateral relations.

Also Monday, Park said she hopes that the deal would lessen the pains of former comfort women as she described the deal as an outcome made by the best efforts at a time when time is running out.

The issue has gained urgency in recent years as the victims are dying off. In 2007, more than 120 South Korean victims were alive, but the number has since dropped to 46, with their average age standing at nearly 90.

“What’s important is to take necessary measures to alleviate the pains of comfort women through a faithful and quick implementation of the deal,” Park said in a public message posted on the Web site of the presidential office.

She also sought understanding from the public and comfort women over the deal from a broader perspective.

Park also met with Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida after the Japanese top diplomat produced the deal with his South Korean counterpart Yun Byung-se in Seoul.

“The comfort women issue is an issue whereby many women under the then military’s involvement bore deep scars to their honor and dignity, and from this perspective, the Japanese government acutely feels responsible,” Kishida said in a joint press conference with Yun at the Foreign Ministry.

2 Comments

  1. Horangih Gomtoki

    December 28, 2015 at 11:04 AM

    Shouldn’t the real issue be that both Japan and South Korea are still under American military occupation? And that both nations offer their women as PROSTITUTES to American soldiers?

    And both nations are sexual colonies of Western powers that come to grab Korean women who are now so eager to look white and have white-looking babies?

    Comfort Women stuff happened long time ago.
    But from 1945 to now, both Japan and South Korea have been whore-nations of the US empire. And so many Japanese and Korean women have been taken by Americans to be wives, and their wombs were used to produce children for non-Asians.

    That is the bigger shame. South Korea and Japan are like Saigon during the Vietnam War when the US turned the South into one big whorehouse where Vietnamese women were whores of American soldiers.

    Reply

  2. Amanza

    December 28, 2015 at 1:37 PM

    Really? I feel sorry for Mr Gomtoki with regards to his response. However, I do understand his mindset.
    The issue of Comfort Women is far different than whatever else is express with regards to women of Asian countries being girlfriends, wives or prostitutes to American military men. This is due to more than one way of reasoning. The main difference lies with the fact that Comfort Women had no say or choice in the matter. The decision was made for them through one means or another. On the other hand, Asian women who are now or have in the pass, been girlfriends,wives or served as prostitutes to American military men, pretty much made that choice. I will not be naive to disregard the idea that there might have been some of these women whom have been at a disadvantage. Nonetheless, it is of no extent and not should it be place in or anywhere in the same category as that of what took place during such horrific period.
    Your language expresses strong racial and ethnic hatred. While this is a passionate issue for the victims, families and all who has been involved, this issue should not be something that is used to make or express our own personal statements of hatred for cultural, sentimental and generational changes and differences of choices.

    Reply