Another S. Korean sex slavery victim during WWII passes away, 8 alive

SEOUL, Sept. 7 (Xinhua) — Another South Korean victim of sex slavery for the Japanese Imperial Army during World War II passed away, reducing the number of living victims to eight, an advocacy group for the victims said Saturday.
A granny, who was victimized by the Japanese military sexual slavery, died without hearing a proper apology from the Japanese government, the Korean Council for Justice and Remembrance for the Issues of Military Sexual Slavery by Japan, a civic group for the former sex slaves, said on its website.
She settled down at the place where she was victimized even after the Korean Peninsula’s liberation from Japan’s 1910-45 colonial rule.
The granny managed to return home a long time afterwards, the advocacy group noted.
With her death, the number of living “comfort women” victims fell to eight in South Korea, all of them aged between 94 and 96, according to Yonhap news agency.
“Comfort women” refer to girls and women kidnapped or forced into sex enslavement for Japan’s military brothels before and during World War II.
According to historians, at least 200,000 women, mostly Koreans, were deceivably or forcibly mobilized to “comfort stations” of the Japanese Imperial Army in Japan, China, Southeast Asia and islands of the South Pacific.
A total of 240 South Korean women have officially identified themselves as the former sex slaves.
The sex slavery victims and civic group activists have held a rally every Wednesday in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul since Jan. 8, 1992, calling for an apology and reparation from the Japanese government. ■