Rare footage shows Korean 'comfort women' from World War Two

Abe and co never felt remorse. This is the sad part. In Germany, if you say "seig hail" expect 3 months in prison. In Japan, if you say "it didn't happen", you can write lesson books or be a politition.

Perhaps what it will take is for these issues to be covered in history classes for all students to acknowledge the past and not try to bury it?

Revising history is ongoing in Japan and it is watched with concern by other Nations. Saying sorry on one hand then denying it happened in history taught to Japanese students on the other is hardly facing and owning up to your past. It is for these reasons that other Nations will continue to make it News, so that each generation of Japanese understands the truth of their ancestors past actions.

Many Countries have skeletons in their closets but they accept and teach this to all generations to ensure it never happens again. If Japan followed this example it could move on.

Perhaps what it will take is for these issues to be covered in history classes for all students to acknowledge the past and not try to bury it?

Exactly this. Japan needs to stop pretending this didn't happen.

Smith, you mention Hiroshima memorials, but they are in the Atom Bomb Park.

Imagine if the US were to apologize repeatedly and pay reparations repeatedly. Imagine if Japanese groups were to increasingly place accusatory golden statues in the street facing US embassies around the world.

This is not to excuse anything from the past, but to say there are other ways of doing things now, and we need to be able shed our skin and evolve naturally together.

And so it rumbles on - an apology and a whole wad of cash didn't work... what on earth WILL end this? The new Emperor next year on his knees before the South Korean people? I can't imagine them being satisfied with much else TBH.

To forget "finally and irreversibly" means history can be made unreal?

Nobody here is old enough to "know" what really happened.

You're probably correct that no JT posters are old enough to remember, but there are still living victims and perpetrators that remember.

The same report also says that some were already prostitutes to start with

(Emphasis added.)

Some is not all.

Kazuaki:

Have you ever referenced non-Japanese sources? Here are a couple of good starting points:

Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan

Embracing Defeat

Japan at War: An Oral History (Since most Japanese claim non-Japanese are just Japan-bashing when those non-Japanese point out facts, this book defeats that argument. Every story is from the mouths of Japanese that experienced the war.)

As for burdens of proof, there are a plethora of non-Japanese sources that evidence these things did occur. However, as stated above, Japanese dismiss those sources and point to the lack of Japanese government records as evidence nothing was amiss. The Japanese government burned the records but couldn't burn the non-Japanese records.

SKorean ex president Park claimed victims remain victims/offenders remain offenders for 1000 years. No amount of apologies/laws will satisfy Korea or China.

Again??

This is neverending....

All Abe and the ultra rightwingers need to do is really apologise and put the apology in the history text books for all to see. A real apology would work. "I'm sorry you're upset," is NOT an apology. If it were something that Japanese schoolchildren studied, it would serve to avoid the same thing happening in the future and Koreans would feel the sincerity.

Germany did it. So can Japan.

It's hilarious how Japanese and their apologists use the rationale that this did not occur because the Japanese have no records of it. There tends to be no records after you burn them in the face of utter defeat.

Why then do the publishers not correct their editorial position but, instead, continue to repeat the falsehoods?

Sadly, it also appears that even though such facts have been discussed, either there are other new members who do not know them, or other old members who continue to knowingly promote falsehoods therefore it requires saying again and again.

For the sake of those with "intellectual integrity" attempt to clarify the issues in their own minds or those, again, deliberately misled to imagine rightful criticism is only "right wing Japanese revisionism", try ...

Professor emeritus at Seoul University, Ahn Byong Jik, opposed the view generally held in South Korea that comfort women were forcibly conscripted writing, “Comfort women were recruited by business operators in Korea, and there was no need for the military to abduct them.”

Professor Jun Bong-Gwan, professor of Korean Literature at the Korean Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, wrote in Korea’s leading newspaper Chosun Ilbo that,

"After reading the book, I was a little bit disappointed because there was nothing in the book that I didn’t know.

We all knew that Korean comfort women were not coercively taken away by Japanese military. Japanese military commissioned Korean prostitution brokers to recruit women in the Korean Peninsula and operate comfort stations in the battlefields."

Furthermore, he went on to say,

"Korean fathers and brothers who sold their daughters and sisters. Korean prostitution brokers who took women away on false pretenses at times, and Korean town chiefs who encouraged those acts – they all should be held accountable someday."

And, for those who care about "intellectual integrity" we need to weigh up such evidence as this story,

"About 100 Korean women were abducted by Korean prostitution brokers but were rescued by Japanese military police.”

Or they might consider Professor James E. Auer findings, he is an emeritus professor of international relations and public policy at Vanderbilt University.

"Japan has never denied that its military licensed comfort stations where Korean comfort women worked ... Japan has apologized for Korean women’s suffering ... its sincerity was backed by 50 odd years of good behavior ... Korean presidents have used nationalism to bolster their low approval ratings."

Or consider the memoir of a former Korean comfort woman Mun Oku-chu (무료배송 버마전선 일본군 위안부 문옥주) who wrote,

"When I went to a cabaret where Japanese military men hung out ... some of them asked me "Why are you still here?" I replied "I am still here because I don’t want to go home. I want to go back to Rangoon."

What is interesting about her case is, she actually killed a non-commissioned officer, who was drunk and held a sword against her and she won a full acquittal as it was a legitimate self-defense.

She wrote that,

"... many military men were pleased with that court decision".

Had the system been as unjust and abusive as the hate mob claim, would they have allow such a "victim" to get away with killing an officer?

With interested added, she saved 50,000 Yen at a time when an average house in Tokyo cost 5,000 Yen.

She continued,

"I worked in Daegu as a nanny and a street seller from the childhood but I remained poor no matter how hard I worked. I could not believe that I could have so much money in my saving account.

A house in Daegu cost 1,000 yen at the time.

I could let my mother have an easy life. I felt very happy and proud."

Once more: "The term is used to describe girls and women from Japan, South Korea, China, the Philippines and elsewhere, who were mostly but not exclusively tricked or forced by Koreans and Japanese into prostitution in Japanese wartime military brothels."

Hope that is easier to read!

zichiToday 10:50 am JSTUS Army Report 49. Military investigation of 20 captured comfort women in Burma.

Historians do not rely on any single document or testimony for their understanding of historical events; rather, they look at many different documents and testimonies to corroborate what actually took place. 

Correct, which is why I am very curious if the film that was released provided any further information. But in the face of paucity of records and documents, that which is available must form the basis of investigation. Especially when it's credibility level in terms of time of documentation and who produced it is very high. We would need further documentation on that level before discrediting it. Yet, that report is widely discredited on the basis of verbal testimony of surviving comfort women, whose testimony was found to be unreliable by Prof Ahn and found contradictory by prof Park. So yes, I would very much like to see more documentation become available.

The question is, why does this website, one that ostensibly makes it money out of promoting Japan, keep posting what is basically the same copy and paste article again and again and again?

An article that is as intellectually dishonest as it is inaccurate and making unground claims.

It is ridiculous.

And it is plain wrong to say, as groups and individuals are clearly being directed to do that the term comfort women "is used to describe girls and women ... who were forced into prostitution in Japanese wartime military brothels". The word is Ianfu and it is merely a polite term for a common prostitute.

A no name academic, from an unnamed group making a claim with absolutely no evidence pumped up by logical fallacies. Define "sponsored by Korean government". Is that likely to make it more honest and true?

Really? You have to be kidding.

From the Chosun Ilbo,

"A team headed by Prof. Jung Chin-sung at Seoul National University spent two years combing through the archives of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration."

So, they spent two years and found nothing. That is the story.

A team was sponsored to dig up some sh*t to use against Japan and this is all they found.

Surely if it is a big story they would have found plenty of evidence? Or will they just claim "the Americans destroy it all too!"

An 18-second film clip of some prostitutes somewhere upon which they project the usual memes.

Again,

"South Korean activists estimate that there may have been as many as 200,000 Korean victims".

Name them, name their group, show how they came to that conclusion, and on the basis of what evidence.

The estimated figure, a "high estimate" and one of a number of estimate of all wartime prostitutes, actually came from a Japanese academic Yoshimi Yoshiaki (who also spent decade researching and came up with basically zero evidence).

Do you know what the evidence he found was? A warning to officers about the unethical treatment of women by local (Korean) brothel agents and to put a stop to it.

The only thing the "activists" did was claim they were all Korean. As, equally ridiculously, Chinese activists now claim there were 200,000 Chinese ones.

@zichi

The reason I deconstructed FENDnow ... and trust me I was very limited in my criticism due to the degree of timing wasting censorship on this website ... was as a warning to show you and other how these groups and individuals work and what is required before talking on board anything that is being said. FEND is just an anonymous blog of a clearly imbalanced individual with their own axes to grind.

Imagine what could have been achieved if they'd invested that $30 million into something like the Polaris Project that is fighting trafficking that is happening today and tomorrow.

https://polarisproject.org/sex-trafficking

Now, tell me what is the value of arguing over something that happen over 70 years ago, the individuals involved already being dead, and why it is being done?

These Koreans think they are being successful in giving Japan a bad name. In fact, what they are doing is giving Koreans a bad name with all their nonsense.

Allow me to correct your first statement, it should read

"Japan has been wilfully given a bad name and made to look as if it is denying them and unrepentant".

Beyond merely inherent racist attitudes towards Japan acting as an amplifier, there have been a number of different parties deliberate set out to damage Japan in such a manner.

Of which I would exclude the original Japanese-Korean feminists who first raised the issue in the 1970s.

What the current events prove is that nothing Japan can or could do will stop it, nothing, merely because it is too politically useful and effective for its accusers, and those seeking to use the issue, to posturize, for their own moral or professional beneft.

This is not just happened in Asia, with North Korean, South Korean and Chinese campaigns (each with their slant on the issue), but also within the US where there are quite separate power politics going on within the Asian-American community. Some of which is serving and co-ordinated by the motherland, some of which is simply motivated by Korean-American identity politics, other of which is directed by Chong Dae Hyup's American affiliates.

I would argue against there being a "wealth of testimonial". Partly because so much of the "testimony" has been proven unreliable, starting with Kim Hak-Sun herself. That there were "sex crimes" carried out in WWII, no one is denying. What one cannot establish was that the IJA was any worse or any better than any other army right up until this day. Yes it is being made to look as such, conveniently distracting from every other army in the region right up until this day.

Rather, these people are taking a few, exaggerated cases and then claiming all were equally as bad. The evidence shows that is not true.

Equally, it's also a convenient myth that a desire for reason and accuracy is a "right wing denial" neatly and deliberately fitting into the pattern established and exploited by the Jewish Holocaust Industry. A movement that has been studied and replicated in this issue portraying today's Japan in the same light as neo-Nazis.

Take, for example, Professor Park Yuha in South Korea and the way she was treated.

It might help readers to know that one of the primary groups involved, the daughter of a leader to which the infamous Asahi Shimbum reporter was married to, "Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery" (Chong Dae Hyup 정대협 挺対協) was formed by the South Korean communists.

Its leader said publicly stated that its aim is to defame Japan for the next 200 years.

Chong Dae Hyup is currently confining surviving women in a nursing home (the House of Nanumu) and only allowing access to outsiders was when Chong Dae Hyup needed them.

Surviving comfort women reported to Park that they were being coached by Chong Dae Hyup to give false testimonies, forced had to obey Chong Dae Hyup's order and those who accepted Japan's compensation were vilified as traitors.

Several of the Chong Dae Hyup's leaders have been arrested as North Korean spies in South Korea.

It is using the comfort women issue for its own political purpose, which is to drive a wedge into U.S.-Japan-South Korea security partnership. Chong Dae Hyup, who have hosted the weekly protests in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul since 1990s, are merely using the comfort women issue to block reconciliation between Japan and South Korea.

The same is happening within Japan with Far Left/Communist leaning Japanese, and North Korea leaning Koreans.

Park has estimated that at least 95% of comfort women were Japanese and Korean women (both Japanese citizens at the time) and not coerced.

Uemura Takashi, the Asahi Shimbum reporter, confused the number of factory workers conscripted ("women's volunteer corps", 150,000 Japanese and 50,000 Korean) and comfort women of which there were an estimated 5,000 to 20,000.

The bottomline is, look beneath the surface to see what is really going on and is being carried out by whom, for what ends. Follow the money.

These people have no desire for truth, no desire for reason, they raison d'etre is to damage Japan and damage world, particularly US support for Japan. I would suspect the vast majority of commentators have no idea how they are being played in this issue.

One last question, however, to ask is whether said individuals even believe in what they are doing, e.g. serving the Communist cause (both 'Juche' and the Chinese), or are just making money out of doing it?

Park found that Korean collaborators that were mainly responsible for taking Korean women, sometimes using coercion.

What the contemporary US Military Intelligence reports said was,

"All Korean prostitutes that POWs have seen in the Pacific were volunteers or had been sold by their parents into prostitution. This is proper in the Korean way of thinking, but direct conscription of women by the Japanese would be an outrage that the old and young alike would not tolerate. Men would rise up in a rage, killing Japanese no matter what consequence they might suffer."

A similar outrage was reported in Korea, by Koreans, to the fabrications created by Seiji Yoshida regarding events on Jeju Island where the IJA was supposed to have forcibly taken women. Fabrications that have been used as foundations for the myth.

Koreans were outraged by his claims because they portrayed them as weak. No reports were found among those alive. Indeed they said if the army had done that, they would have risen up against them.

Seiji Yoshida was another Far Left winger actually ejected from Communist Party for his imbalance extremism.

His fictional work was used by George Hicks in the seminal "The Comfort Women: Japan's Brutal Regime of Enforced Prostitution in the Second World War" book as if it was fact, and yet it was used in both the UN Commission Coomaraswamy report and the US Congressional Report.

Later he admit his falsehood and outrightly stated that, "There is no profit in writing the truth in books" yet its effect remains in the popular consciousness.

Confusion over the nationality of the recruiters arose because many Koreans used their Japanese names at that time, as indeed the Korean-Japanese in and running Yukasa groups do to this day.

In 2014, the Asahi Shimbun announced that they concluded the testimony of Yoshida as a fabrication having dispatched reporters to Jeju Island and interviewing about 40 elderly residents. It concluded that Yoshida’s accounts “are false”. (Similar investigations by Korean media had happened years before).

The ex-Asahi reporter who wrote "the comfort woman story" has since left Japan with his Korean wife to teach in South Korea, presumably awaiting the glorious North Korea to regain the pennisula ...

I disagree with zichi and wholeheartedly welcome Hammerhead's contributory posts. Facts and supportable evidence needs to be repeated as any discussion on this subject always becomes buried in fallacies. Japan has never and does NOT DENY the existence of the Comfort Women System. Far more evidence exists that 200,000 women were NOT kidnapped by Japanese troops and thrown into Sexual Slavery, than evidence that supports it.

OH MY GOODNESS! When will enough be enough? It happened, apologies were made, monies were paid, acknowledgements were given, what more do these greedy people want? I know it was sooooo disgusting and dispicable, but it is high time to move on.

Given that there is only 18 seconds of footage, it will be rather difficult to determine much other than the women in fact existing at that location, but of course it'll be used as evidence on the infamous Worst Possible Variant.

Go ahead and watch it, it's surprisingly telling.

Schopenhauer: "Hard to understand their negative passion."

Never been forced into sexual slavery, raped repeatedly, watched others bayoneted for getting pregnant by rapists, then told it never happened by those who did it and called money grubbers and whores before? Then I doubt you could understand anything about it whatsoever, no.

Kazuaki: "They don't seem to be crying. If you tell me that was a scene of two men chatting up 7 women I'll believe it"

You'll believe anything your told by Japanese right-wing white-washers on the issue, and that's all there is to it. You'll believe anything but what happened.

It's true that this video actually PROVES nothing. There could have been anything going on.

OssanAmerica: "One of the main reasons that this issue is perpetuated is that some believe such nonsense."

no, it's perpetuated because you call it nonsense. You yourself have stated matter-of-factory that they were "well-paid prostitues" or if coerced it was SK that did it... not Japan. And you wonder why japan and people who wish they were Japanese and deny the issues need to apologize.

What happened is terrible however at some point people need to let go of this. Japan has been emasculated and de-balled and regardless of whether or not Abe changes Article 9 will never revert to what it was.

So many things have happened throughout history if we all held these types of grudges none of us would ever talk to each other.

Holding grudges like this accomplishes nothing positive.

Time to let go and try to focus on present day issues where Korea and Japan can cooperate (and there are many obvious ones nowadays).

You'll believe anything your told by Japanese right-wing white-washers on the issue, and that's all there is to it. You'll believe anything but what happened.

Well, Smith, right above your post a "right-wing white washer" was confident enough in his position to actually provide a Youtube video containing those famed 18 seconds of clip. Despite the voiceover, while they clearly aren't happy I must really disagree with the assertion they even looked scared or in fear or terrified, and even if they were, judging from the footage it is at least as likely they are scared of their "liberators" possibly deciding to kill them for being "collaborators" than anything to do with sex slavery.

This issue, as well as many others related to Japan's empire building from the late 19th century through its defeat in WWII, will be kept in the public eye through at least the 2020 Olympics. The Tokyo Games will represent the perfect opportunity to cast the global media spotlight one more time on what Japan did, and whether or not it has properly atoned for its actions.

Instead of conceding the point, inciters insist that the records must have been there, must have been somewhere in the ash pile...

Inciters insist . . . Nice rhetorical slight. The correct term would be "intellectually honest people."

Swift_JusticeToday 10:06 am JSTKazuaki:

As for burdens of proof, there are a plethora of non-Japanese sources that evidence these things did occur.

Please tell me what evidence exists in the United States that "these things" did occur. By "these things" I presume you mean the fallacious belief that all Comfort Women were kidnapped by Japanese troops and became "sex slaves".

We spent 4 years fighting a vicious war with the Japanese Empire and our intelligence corp were busy gathering every possible issue that could be used against them for the eventual War Crimes Trials. Yet nothing regarding "Comfort Women" despite our knowledge of them and even interrogating and repatriating some of them. I'd be very interested in reading such U.S. sources.

 our intelligence corp were busy gathering every possible issue that could be used against them for the eventual War Crimes Trials.

This is a false statement. Our intelligence corp was gathering intelligence regarding how best to engage the enemy, not for trials that were not even thought about until 1945.

Swift_JusticeJuly 7 01:13 pm JSTBy "these things" I presume you mean the fallacious belief that all Comfort Women were kidnapped by Japanese troops and became "sex slaves".

You presume incorrectly.

Very helpful of you to state what "these things" mean.

Evidence of WHAT exactly?

At the end of the day, the last line sums it up.

They want to gouge more money, for what? So shame on Korea.

That's fine Zichi, it just confirm the trend we have already established.

What is your point? That what 20 girls 'said' is therefore true for all of a mythical 200,000?

"The Japanese Imperial Army controlled every aspect of the military brothels except for the actual recruiting which was decided better left to agents of the Korean police."

Therefore, the offenders were Koreans. Don't you agree?

However, "agents of the Korean police" is problematic, because we know the Korean police did not employ 'prostitute procurers'. The structure of the Korean police force is very well documented.

Therefore the report is faulted and requires handling with caution. It depends on verbal accounts of just 20 women it itself describes as "ignorant and uneducated ... childish, and selfish ... don't like to discuss their profession or family" captured on August 10, 1944, after the fall of Myitkyina in Burma. Read the section on "personality" and bear in mind from other case we know their families sold them.

“A comfort girl is nothing more than a prostitute or professional camp follower attached to the Japanese Army for the benefit of the soldiers ... They lived in near-luxury in Burma in comparison to other places. They lived well because their food and material was not heavily rationed and they had plenty of money with which to purchase desired articles"

Possibly "Korean agents controlled by the Korean police" would have been more accurate. As in, it was the Korean police's initial responsibility to police their activities, not the IJA's. The IJA was busy fighting a war at that the time and had very limited forces in Korea.

However, there are copious amounts of newspaper articles and statistics clearly demonstrating that Korean Police conducted crackdowns on kidnappings and abductions. Explain why the Police would be both recruiting and cracking down at the same time?

Your quoted report goes on to state,

"They were able to buy cloth, shoes, cigarettes, and cosmetics to supplement the many gifts given to them by soldiers who had received comfort bags from home…. While in Burma they amused themselves by participating in sports events with both officers and men, and attended picnics, entertainments, and social dinners. They had a phonograph; and in towns they were allowed to go shopping.”

*"There were numerous instances of proposals of marriage and in certain cases marriages actually took place**". *

Does that sound like "slavery"?

The report also says,

"In the latter part of 1943 the Army issued orders that girls who had paid their debt could return home.

*Some of the girls were thus allowed to return to Korea***.**"

Was it slavery if they were able to leave? Why did they not choose to do so? How much money, upfront, were they paid?

It would help to have a copy of the contract they signed. Presumably if they, or their Korean fathers or brothers, returned the deposit they were paid they could have left sooner?

Then approach it logically, we know that there were approximately over 8,500 Korean police officers at the time (Source: Korea Governor-General Office of Statistics).

How much police time or how many officers and agents would it have taken for 8,500 men to procure, hold and process 200,000 women against their will? Where are the records for it happen?

Professor An Byon-jik of Seoul University, performed joint research with the Korean Council on the Comfort Women for a couple of years preceding the UN's Coomaraswamy Report. He reported that,

“I did in-depth research on this but to the best of my knowledge there is NO document that indicated that the Japanese Army had forcibly recruited women and girls. Logically, why would there be a need for forced recruitment in the days Indentured Prostitution was widely accepted practice due to poverty."

Gendai-Korea (Korea Today), May 2007

Sadly most of the comfort women didn’t make it home. More than 50% of them were killed or died. The suicide rate was 40%. Some were murdered by Japanese soldiers in murder-suicide.

And some, on this very thread, use the word "greedy".

Out of interest, what is the ratio of poster here, male/female?

I really, really hate to think that this topic is dominated by males. Just take a look at (some) comments to see why...

zichiToday 02:37 am JSTOssanAmerica

Zichi, stop bringing me into YOUR discussion with Hammerhead. When overwhelmed with actual facts that question one's belief, are you going to close you eyes and run away?

That's incorrect and I'm not overwhelmed by anything but as you are well aware, there have been so many posts on JT on this topic, so no I don't feel like rehashing all that with a poster who has been here for just a few weeks

You say incorrect but your actions clearly speak otherwise. Much of the material that Hamerhead has posted has rarely if ever been discussed here, mainly because of the large anti-J crowd. How long a poster has been here is utterly irrelevant to the issue. This is a rare opportunity for you to prove many of your views. I am not the one arguing with him. YOU are.

It's not going to go away. And rightly so.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/07/10/an-18-second-clip-released-by-south-korea-appears-to-offer-first-footage-of-wwii-comfort-women/?utm_term=.34f7e5e32297

LudditeToday 07:38 pm JSTPerhaps what it will take is for these issues to be covered in history classes for all students to acknowledge the past and not try to bury it?

Exactly this. Japan needs to stop pretending this didn't happen.

One of the main reasons that this issue is perpetuated is that some believe such nonsense. Nobody denies the Comfort Women system existed. If Japan "denied" their existence how could they have agreed with South Korea to resolve this issue permanently?

This film simply confirm the existence of the Comfort Women, which is already known to all and not disputed by anybody. It would have significance only if contained anything, or came with records which contradicted US Army Report 49. I'd rather hear more about that.

"The term is used to describe girls and women from* **Japan**, South Korea, China, the Philippines and elsewhere, who were mostly but not exclusively tricked/forced by Koreans and Japanese ***into prostitution in Japanese wartime military brothels."

(Quote, but in the interests of further accuracy, with a little editing.)

Some of the women found it in themselves to forgive. Most probably did not. These statues harden attitudes and do little for improvement of international relations, IMHO.

Those news footages are like new found DNA evidence which warrants a new criminal trial or agreements as the case maybe.

Renegotiations as demanded by Seoul is therefore just plain reasonable.

zichiJuly 6 09:54 pm JST It would have significance only if contained anything, or came with records which contradicted US Army Report 49.

What contradiction would that be? The report states that the women/girls were not told/aware that they would become prostitutes thinking they would become nurses, at least according to Report 49 which actually was only about 20 women/girls so impossible to say what happened with the many tens and even hundreds of thousands of prostitutes.

The same report also says that some were already prostitutes to start with. If there are no contradictions mentioned, let's not play games guessing.

The thorny side of Mt. Fuji:

Japan 1 : OK , we apologize and give financial assistance to so-called ' Comfort Women' .

Japan 2 : It was not Japan who recruited the CW , it was Koreans.

Japan 3 : The CW were not coerced or forced by JIA , they were volunteers and after high pay. Some were prostitutes.

Japan 4: OK, Tokyo give money, now shut up 4-ever!

As for evidence, you can clearly read, so I suggest you do just that. Here is a link to a list to get you started:

https://www2.gwu.edu/~memory/research/bibliography/comfortwomen.html

Unit 731 was quite famous even without any trials for them, but comfort women came up in the early 1990s after Asahi produced a serial article on "sex slave victims by Japanese army" which later turned out to be based on fake testimonies. 

The Japanese government doesn't deny comfort women existed. They reject the idea the government constructed its structure. If the system was a governmental scheme, a part of the duties for officers, it isn't hard to imagine records of orders/manuals of some kind remained, but there weren't any unlike SKorean government during the Vietnam war who did keep such records. 

I infer many comfort women were sold/lied to by their own parents for money which is unimaginable or too hard for victims to come to terms with.

SKorean ex president Park claimed victims remain victims/offenders remain offenders for 1000 years. No amount of apologies/laws will satisfy Korea or China.

Even if your paraphrasing is correct, it doesn't change the fact that Cimfirt Women were sex slaves or that Japan's leadership consistently denies it.

Thank you.

Professor Park Yu-ha, the Korean women professor mentioned above, reduced her estimates to 95% voluntary, 5% forced or coerced putting the blame squarely on Korean agents. When she published her study, she was sued for defamation by the Communist sympathizer group.

She won a criminal case against and was aquitted in Korea court.

She had written that there was no evidence that the Japanese government was officially involved in, and therefore legally responsible for, forcibly recruiting the women from Korea,

Her suggestion was that Korea and Japan should both admit responsibility equally and simultaneously. Japan has done so on numerous occasions, the Korean government has not.

In his review of her book, Professor Jun Bong-Gwan wrote,

"Korean fathers and brothers who sold their daughters and sisters, Korean prostitution brokers who took women away on false pretenses at times and Korean town chiefs who encouraged those acts – they all should be held accountable someday."

And how do Chong Dae Hyup treat the old ex-comfort women?

When Japan offered compensation through Asian Women’s Fund in 1995, about 60 former Korean comfort women defied Chong Dae Hyup’s order and accepted the compensation. Those 60 women were then vilified and punished as traitors.

Chong Dae Hyup published their names and addresses in newspapers as prostitutes, and they had to live the rest of their lives in disgrace, leaving the remaining old women terrified of Chong Dae Hyup and unable to defy them.”

Park was able to talk to some who communicated this.

If we look at contemporary accounts from Korean newspapers certain patterns emerge. See if you can spot it.

From the Korean newspaper Dong-A Ilbo, August 31, 1939.

악덕소개업자가 발호, 이들이 유괴한 농촌부녀자의 수가 무려 100명 이상. 모두 일본경찰님들이 구출해내심.

Vicious criminal trafficker from Pusan (Korean) was arrested in August 1939 for his “Virgin trade”. His gang of 45 recruiters had abducted more than 100 women from rural areas. They tricked the women by telling them the “Manchurian economy was doing well”. Detectives from Pusan were reported to have gone to Mukden, where relatives of the traders are.

Dong-A Ilbo     June 30, 1933

노상에서 소녀를 유인하여 납치, 추업중인(매춘포주)에게 매도. 범인은 박명동과 이성녀

A girl was kidnapped from the street and sold to a prostitution pimp. The traffickers were Korean (Park Myeong-dong and Lee Seong-nyeo – who was a woman).

Dong-A Ilbo     July 1, 1933

소녀유인단의 수괴 은뽕어멈. 주로 어린 소녀들을 꾀어다가 매음굴에 팔아 먹던 악녀였는데, 일본경찰이 검거함.

A leader of a Korean group who attracted mainly young girls and trafficked them to Korean comfort station owners was arrested by Japanese police last night.

Maeil Shinbo     May 14, 1936

농촌부녀유인 악한을 검거. 여자를 만주에 창기로 팔려던 것을 일본경찰이 검거해서 여성을 구출함. 네명의 여자가 마수를 벗어남.

A villain who had lured women from rural areas was arrested.

The villain, who was an agent for the Korean owners of comfort stations, was trying to sell the women to Manchuria to be prostitutes. He was arrested by Japanese police. They also rescued four women from the hands of the demons.

Dong-A Ilbo March 28, 1939

50여 처녀가 조선인 인신매매단에 걸려서 북지, 만주에 창기로 팔림.

일본경찰이 구해줌.

Over 50 women were deceived by a Korean trafficker (Bae Jang-eon 배장언) and sent to Northern China & Manchuria. He was arrested and the women were rescued by the Japanese police.

Dong-A Ilbo     August 5, 1939

“處女貿易”의誘引魔 北行列車에실린네處女救助 西署에서魔女貞淑을嚴調

처녀무역의 유인마. 일본의 처녀까지 유인하여 중국에 팔아 먹으려는 찰라 일본경찰에 의해 검거됨.

‘Virgin trade’ (Girl Trafficking) inducement demon (Korean, female trafficker). She was trying to lure even Japanese girls and sell them to China but she was arrested by the Japanese police.

Dong-A Ilbo     March 7, 1935

About 2,000 Korean women work at brothels in the Shanghai slums.

Koreans lost face because of these Korean prostitutes who are working abroad. The measures to help them are vague in spite of their miserable lives. It is a shame, but because they are working voluntarily due to their economic problems, there is no solution.

Maeil Shinbo     March 28, 1939

농촌처녀 유인해서 100 여명을 팔아먹음. 부자와 4촌이 가족친지 조선인 납치단임. 이걸 일본경찰이 검거해서 여성들을 구해줌.

The culprits lured girls from farming villages and sold 100 of them.

The Korean trafficking gang were all family relatives, a father, son and a cousin. The Japanese police arrested them and rescued the women.

This was the "evidence" that was used to establish JIA responsibility for the system.

March 4, 1938 notice to Japanese military commanders in China concerning Comfort Women.

Title: “Matters regarding recruitment at military comfort station”

To: Army Chief Generals of the troops in northern China and of the expeditionary force in central China

When brokers recruited comfort women for the establishment of brothels during Sino-Japanese war, there were more than a few infamous cases to which we need to pay attention: the case of some brokers using the authority of the Japanese military for their recruitment, as the result, they ruined the credibility of the Japanese military, which led to a misunderstanding of ordinary people, the case that some brokers used an unruly method of recruiting through embedded journalists and visitors, causing social problems, the case that some brokers were arrested and placed under investigation because their recruiting method was similar to kidnapping. From now, as regards the recruitment of comfort women, the expeditionary force must properly choose and control brokers who recruit comfort women. Also, it is necessary to cooperate with the military police and law enforcement authorities. To keep the prestige of Japanese military, and to consider social problems, take careful note without omission.

So this issue was finally winding down and now out of the blue up pops a Youtube-style "new never seen before footage" of these so called comfort women, two of which have already appeared in other photos, as stated by this article. I would say this can be ignored

This film simply confirm the existence of the Comfort Women, which is already known to all and not disputed by anybody

But great click bait here.

nandakandamanda: "These statues harden attitudes and do little for improvement of international relations, IMHO."

If you honestly believe that, you should be shouting for the Hiroshima memorials to be torn down because it only hardens attitudes and does nothing to help -- people can't forget what the Japanese and American governments did! It's not to remember and never forget, it's all just for grudges!

See how easy that was?

@Swift_JusticeToday  08:30 am JST

I find this equally funny. No records turn up. The defenders say this shows it did not occur, as is their right according to the usual rules of burden of proof. Instead of conceding the point, inciters insist that the records must have been there, must have been somewhere in the ash pile...

By "these things" I presume you mean the fallacious belief that all Comfort Women were kidnapped by Japanese troops and became "sex slaves".

You presume incorrectly.

Amazing ... is this site still hawking this stuff (all over again). And, no, the comfort women system was not one of sex slavery just one based on traditional prostitution.

If we are using "intellectual integrity" as a benchmark, then that should discount anonymous blogs, Zichi (see below) and news stories that do not disclose what bodies they are referring to making claims.

@Swift_Justice

Again, if we are using "intellectual integrity" as a benchmark, then that should also have to take into consideration all the inconvenient evidence that does exist that counters the 'Japan Hate' propoganda. Including the hoary old "there's no evidence because they burnt all the evidence" response (isn't that a bit on the "dog ate my breakfast" level?)

If we are using "intellectual integrity" as a benchmark, then should who is making such claims be stated?

If we are using "intellectual integrity" as a benchmark, then should that exclude anyone who cannot read the original in their original language to understand what was actually stated?

Lastly, if we are using "intellectual integrity" as a benchmark, then we can pretty much discount Korean academics in Korea (but not overseas Koreans) as there is most certainly not the same American freedom in Korea as we expect abroad. They are still into physically beating up and harassing and destroying the careers of anyone who steps out of line. 

Read how they treated Park Yu-ha in 2013.

The unnamed "Korean government-funded research team" is ... what?

Hei-soo Shin who is at the University and leads the Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan and is hardly a neutral player. 

There is plenty of evidence from official records down to military diaries every commander was forced to keep. 

The problem is, a) it does not support the claims of the hate mob, and b) it highlights the local, contracted sex industries as being the offenders (e.g. Koreans running the Korean sex industry in their traditional manner). Indeed, culturally and historically not even really being offenders, but rather just "carrying out business as usual", as they always did, in their own countries.

Just to deconstruct this lastest piece of hate propaganda, the video does not prove "forced". The 200,000 figure is mythic, is not supported by any evidence whatsoever. It was always only an high estimate, amongst many estimates. There is no evidence whatsoever to support all of the mythic 200,000 were forced and badly treated. In fact, there is plenty of evidence to support that they were not. Including evidence of higher pay than senior ranking officers.

The article and group in question are also establishing a falsehood with their 1990s and no Koreans claim. In fact, the movement was started in the 1970s raised by Japanese and Korean women academics working together prior to it being coopted by racists and nationalists. At the time the Korean government was encouraging sex tourism for Japanese businessmen, which the feminists were campaigning against.

When they say, "South Korea has not had its own data on comfort women and (has) been relying on Japanese and American data", they are stating an untruth. Koreans and Korean-Americans have been doing some of the best research into the issue. Much of which contradicts the Japan Hate mongers.

They are also wrong about the word ianfu or "comfort women", it just refers to common prostitutes. Not those "forced". They are working assiduously to change its meaning within the international domain.

The international media is acting irresponsibly to continue to repeat it.

They found that the same women had been used, or prostituted themselves, by the IJA had gone on to be used for the American military, and the same business that ran both "camptowns" was, at that time, running sex tourism for Japanese as a way of earning valuable foreign currency. 

Which begs the questions; if it was such a terrible experience, a terrible business, and a terrible offence to all Koreans, why did the Korean government not stop it in 1945? Why did the very same women and brothels go on to serve the Americans (and be bought and sold by them)? Why did the Korean government license and encourage it right up into the 1970s?

Bear in mind that by 1950, the United Nations estimated that 1,000,000 women were involved in the sex industry. 5 time more than the high estimate used to accuse Japan.

Just FYI, that FEND blog is run by Emi Koyama who self describes as a "multi-issue social justice slut, syn hesizing feminist, Asian, survivor, dyke, queer, sex worker, intersex, genderqueer and crip political activist! who is also is responsible for the "whore revolution ... that will fight violence and oppression at every level, including economic violence and the violence by the state or by international organizations". Not surprisingly, Emi currently lives in Portland, Oregon. 

I have no noticed much evidence of the revolution's success but I think it would reasonably discount "her" as a reliable source. I suspect that it is the political equivalent of vaporware, and should be treated as such.

In 1944,,  cameras only one negative  produced.  There was cameras for movie proooduction companies that created roll,s of negatives.  but ppeole did not use. No video camera yet.  It took many more years when one telephone maker became Sony in 1962. 

Authenticity of this photo is questionable as I am sure there are my age people in Japan who remember old cameras.

Swift_JusticeJuly 7 01:16 pm JSTAs for evidence, you can clearly read, so I suggest you do just that. Here is a link to a list to get you started:

https://www2.gwu.edu/~memory/research/bibliography/comfortwomen.html

This is your "evidence in the United States" supporting your view of 200,0000 women kidnapped into slavery by Japanese troops? A collection of opinions by "historians" basing their views on the opinions of other historians, all without definitive evidence?

Try this site:

https://www.archives.gov/files/iwg/reports/final-report-2007.pdf

The United States government carried out a 7 year investigation across multiple agencies into war crimes at a cost of 30 million dollars and could not find any evidence that "200,000 women were kidnapped by IJA troops".

zichiToday 08:13 pm JSTHammerhead

You might be able to read and write in Korean but I cannot read or write it.

What is your point? That what 20 girls 'said' is therefore true for all of a mythical 200,000?

Actually no, and I’ve disagreed many times with OssanAmerican who has stated in numerous comments and posts that the US Military Report on the interrogation of 20 women proves everything. I don’t accept that and have stated that too. I have never stated how many comfort women there were, I don’t know but the historians put the figures at 80,000 to 400,000.

I never stated that Report 49 reflects a picture, ie; no-slavery, no-abduction) of the entire Comfort Women issue. What I have stated is that US Army Report 49 is an authentic documented interrogation report, as compared to 70 year old "testimonies" that even some South Korean scholars have denounced as "not credible". The question I put to you was why you accepted such undocumented "evidence" while trivializing Report 49. You even went so far as to question the linguistic ability of the US Army translators. Asfor you estimated "400,000" comfort women it is widely recognized that the figure came only from one Chinese "historian" and is considered an exaggeration even by CW advocates.

Zichi, stop bringing me into YOUR discussion with Hammerhead. When overwhelmed with actual facts that question one's belief, are you going to close you eyes and run away?

Here's the kicker. Look at the sources, they are all Korean and women. Feminists, indeed. Check them for accuracy.

Let's look for the pattern and de-construct the myth.

In an interview with Professor Chunghee Sarah Soh of San Francisco State University, a former Korean comfort woman Kim Sun-ok said that she was sold by her parents four times.

Yet she testified before UN Special Rapporteur Radhika Coomaraswamy that she was abducted by the Japanese military.

A former Korean comfort woman Mun Oku-chu said in her memoir:

"I was recruited by a Korean comfort station owner. I saved a considerable amount of money from tips, so I opened a saving account. I could not believe that I could have so much money in my saving account. One of my friends collected many jewels, so I went and bought a diamond. I often went to see Japanese movies and Kabuki plays in which players came from the mainland Japan ... I felt very happy and proud. I received permission to return home, but I didn't want to go back to Korea. I wanted to stay in Rangoon."

According to Professor Ahn Byong Jik of Seoul University, Mun Oku-chu continued to work as a prostitute in Korea after the war.

Yet she testified before UN Special Rapporteur Radhika Coomaraswamy that she was abducted by the Japanese military.

In an interview with Korean newspaper The Hankyoreh (15th May 1991) a former Korean comfort woman Kim Hak-sun said that she was sold by her mother.

In 1993 Kim Hak-sun told Professor Ahn Byong Jik of Seoul University, "My mother sent me to train as a Kiseng in Pyongyang and then sold me."

Yet she testified before UN Special Rapporteur Radhika Coomaraswamy that she was abducted by the Japanese military.

In 1993 a former Korean comfort woman Kim Gun-ja told Professor Ahn Byong Jik of Seoul University, "I was sold by my foster father."

Yet she testified before UN Special Rapporteur Radhika Coomaraswamy that she was abducted by the Japanese military.

Yet she testified before UN Special Rapporteur Radhika Coomaraswamy that she was abducted by the Japanese military.

In 1993 a former Korean comfort woman Lee Yong-soo told Professor Ahn Byong Jik of Seoul University, "At the time I was shabbily dressed and wretched. On the day I left home with my friend Kim Pun-sun without telling my mother, I was wearing a black skirt, a cotton shirt and wooden clogs on my feet. You don't know how pleased I was when I received a red dress and a pair of leather shoes from a Korean recruiter."

Yet she testified before UN Special Rapporteur Radhika Coomaraswamy that she was abducted by the Japanese military.

Her false testimony resulted in the passage of United States House of Representatives House Resolution 121.

According to Professor Chunghee Sarah Soh of San Francisco State University, a former Korean comfort woman Moon Pil-ki was recruited by a Korean comfort station owner's agent and taken to Manchuria with four other women.

Yet she testified before UN Special Rapporteur Radhika Coomaraswamy that she was abducted by the Japanese military.

In 1993 a former Korean comfort woman Kil Won-ok told Professor Ahn Byong Jik of Seoul University, "I was sold by my parents."

Yet she testified before UN Special Rapporteur Radhika Coomaraswamy that she was abducted by the Japanese military.

In Professor Chunghee Sarah Soh's book "The Comfort Women", she relates the story of Kim Sun-OK who was sold by her father 4 times from th age of 7 years old for the price of 500 Won (approximately $30). Each time she paid off "her debt" she was returned to her parents who then sold her again ultimately ending up in Manchuria comfort station in 1941.

Her misfortune was to be the pretty daughter and, hence, her parents could get more for her.

According to several witnesses, Chong Dae Hyup (pro-North activist group) coached women to say "I was abducted by the Japanese military."

Professor Ahn Byong Jik of Seoul University says,

"When I interviewed former comfort women in the early 1990s, none of them had anything bad to say about the Japanese military. They hated their parents who sold them and Korean comfort station owners who mistreated them.

But after Chong Dae Hyup put them on its payroll, their testimonies had completely changed."

A former Korean comfort woman Sim Mi-ja who refused to be on Chong Dae Hyup's payroll said,

"The Korean women, who testified before UN Special Rapporteur, lied on behalf of Chong Dae Hyup. They are swindlers".

In an interview with Professor Park Yuha of Sejong University in South Korea, a former Korean comfort woman Bae Chun-hee said she hated her father who sold her. She said that men who recruited Korean women and operated comfort stations were all Korean, and that the women who testified before UN Special Rapporteur lied on behalf of Chong Dae Hyup.

And let's not forget the comfort women who were bought and sold by Koreans to specifically to service Korean workers in Japan for a mere 40 or 50 Won ($3 or $4). Who are they to accuse and sue?

Or the Korean comfort women who were bought and sold along with the furniture of the apartment by American servicemen during the Korean War.

I suppose that is Japan's fault as well and the Korean's and American military has a clean nose?

Funnily enough, we know that more than their noses were clean as, thanks to the Japanese's excellent record keeping, we have the syphillis statistics (45%).

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vJYnL967Rqc/VIWpXfCPOUI/AAAAAAAAA7Q/siqqc8vqlSQ/s3600/kim%2Bsun-ok.jpg

Going back to the issue of "intellectual integrity" that someone else raise earlier, intellectual integrity would demand some modification of positions as new evidence arises. Even a willingness to seek out those sources of new or more accurate information.

I can keep going into more and more specific details about and what happened during and after the WWII, during the American occupation and Korean War, and how the Japan Hate/disinformation campaign was started, manufactured and sustained until it overwhelmed and poisoned the original and quite genuine joint Korean-Japanese feminist campaign.

How the former has been funded and coordinated internationally by the Korean government into the internet age.

Just out of interest, do you know the the the model of the deliberately insulting statue is actually of one of the two 14 year old school girls, Shin Hyo-Soon and Shim Mi-Sun, that were run over and killed by a US army armoured vehicle back in 2002, while walking to a friend's birthday party?

(The two girls were ran over from behind when the driver failed to see them. There were daily protests for weeks demanding that the U.S. military hand over two U.S. soldiers. US soldiers, being immune from prosecution if they commit crimes against the Korean people, were cleared by a US military court).

It is likely that they initially started creating these statues to protest the US army but then had to stop midway because the US pressured them, and the money ran out. So when it came to starting the bogus comfort women campaign, they just pulled it out of storage.

In short, one shakedown replaced another.

I could go into more detail, there is a direction connection in the groups and the politics of separating Japan-USA relationship and USA position in Asia.

At least if you are being played, know what the game is about.

A wise man once said

"Politics on the global stage can often look like children running to teacher."

These Koreans think they are being successful in giving Japan a bad name. In fact, what they are doing is giving Koreans a bad name with all their nonsense.

Actually Japan does have a bad name about this for both the widely accepted belief that it committed the acts and secondly for denying them. Whether or not the events actually happened, Japan looks unrepentant.

It does amaze me that something that is still in living memory and which would have involved a vast number of people, is so controversial. The truth I suspect lies somewhere in between the two camps. Is a girl sold by her father into prostitution, for example, a prostitute or a sex slave? Does someone begin as a willing prostitute and end up as a sex slave? How many slipped into it through fear, hunger and coercion?

Given the wealth of testimonial evidence across nationalities and countries, in the balance of probability, it is Japan that did wrong and continued denials from the right wing do not help Japan.

@Zichi

We were specifically discussing Kore and the Korean women of 1943/44, don't change the subject to 1932. Actually, according to the AWF and military documents, private agents first opened brothels for officers and men stationed in China, around the time of the Manchurian Incident in 1931.

I have no problems with a well organized, legislated and policed sex industry serving the military as the Comfort Women system was. Far better that than the alternative.

The agents were private businesses/individuals "policed" by the police and contracted to the army as any military supplier.

Do you understand the difference?

Whether you were a business providing boots or women, the military set its standards to be met and the agents agreed to meet them.

Whether those business cut corners or were dishonest in their supply was the responsibility of the businesses, and the documents show that when the military discovered evidence of abuses, they clamped down upon them, time and time again.

Those conditions stipulated, e.g. over 21, not coerced, fully voluntarily. Clearly, it was not the nature of th Korean sex industry and the Korean sex industry carried on as it had done, and how it continued to do so after WWII ... and, indeed, up until this day tricking and coercing young women, exploiting poverty, using debt bondage and extorting prostitutes for high charges in brothels.

Not the army.

historians put the figures at 80,000 to 400,000.

Do you understand the meaning of the logical fallacy, "appeal to authority"? Appeals to authority are not valid arguments (even in they are constantly used in media articles on this topic).

Which historians? Name them. Allow us to check their credentials, examine their findings, their linguistic abilities, and the evidence they used to come to their conclusions.

For example, if a "historian" cannot read old Japanese (bear in mind that many present day native Japanese find it difficult to read official Showa Japanese documents), I tend to question their authority as all of their opinions are dependant on second or third sources, and exclude the original ones. Same too with Korean, as without Korean how would they know what was widely published across the Korean media and official documents of the time.

I think by "historian" you actually mean "Chinese Communist Party propagandist" which kind of shoots down your own credibility in this area too, if you cannot tell the difference between the two.

Ditto, again, you write "agents of the police". The police did not have agents. Can you admit that?

Hard to understand their negative passion.

Korea needs to mature up on this issue and stop using it for pure politics.

Tokyo-Engr:

What happened is terrible however at some point people need to let go of this.

That may be true, but Germany did the morally right thing and made sincere apologies while the victims and/or their families were still alive and have tried their best to make amends so that we can learn from history.

Unfortunately, the nastier elements in Japan continues to give a wishy-washy 'apology', if at all (and then backtrack or play down everything), while patiently waiting until the very last victim and their families are dead and buried. Of course, half the blame goes to the Americans who, in their obsession to chase down every single communist in every corner of the world, decided to let half the Japanese war criminals get off scot-free and becomes the 'new' government. Nothing changed after the war.

Nao: "I infer many comfort women were sold/lied to by their own parents for money which is unimaginable or too hard for victims to come to terms with."

Because you were obviously there. No way that a colonizing force, which took Korea by force and murdered millions across Asia, could have possibly forced any women to do something they didn't want. Nope. But hey, easy to believe their parents sold them! You're not responsible for what your ancestors did, Nao, but denying it happened makes you complicit in the lies and deceit, and makes you also need to apologize.

Swift Justice: "It's hilarious how Japanese and their apologists use the rationale that this did not occur because the Japanese have no records of it. There tends to be no records after you burn them in the face of utter defeat."

Precisely, but you still see corporations here doing the same thing to this very day. "Oh... well... we have no minutes of that emergency meeting, sorry... but just trust us what we said happened, happened." or, "Oh, well, we had to delete the record of what the troops were doing, so guess we'll never know despite all the reports to the contrary!" etc. They also deny forced suicides in Okinawa, too!

To me, the whole contention is if the Japanese military/government was managing it right?

anyway, at this point, shouldn't smart people understand that it was a terrible time, and understand that it is not continuing, and move on? It just seems so crazy making. But understanding politics, that's what create emotions and gets votes. Idiots!

Nobody here is old enough to "know" what really happened.

The victors in war write (or re-write) history and whitewash themselves as heroes.

The sad truth is that probably a lot of women were raped and also that a lot were prostitutes, but at this point it's ridiculous to keep harping on it as there's no proof of anything either way.

War has been getting more and more humane and we should strive to keep making progress for sure. But if every country or people held grudges for centuries we will end up just killing more people.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be on Youtube yet, but if the picture of them showing it here is any indicator:

http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=3035516&cloc=joongangdaily%7Chome%7Conline

What am I supposed to decipher out of this scene? I see six women (maybe #7 is just to the right of the FoV cutoff) and two men. the women don't look too emaciated. They don't seem to be crying. If you tell me that was a scene of two men chatting up 7 women I'll believe it.

And BTW

"South Korea has not had its own data on comfort women and(has) been relying on Japanese and American data," said Kang Sung-hyun, an academic on the team.

I'm not sure I really wanted to learn this.

Given that there is only 18 seconds of footage, it will be rather difficult to determine much other than the women in fact existing at that location, but of course it'll be used as evidence on the infamous Worst Possible Variant.