Japan, South Korea Agree to Aid for ‘Comfort Women’

Deal will include support services using Japanese government funds.

South Korea and Japan said they reached an agreement on Korean “comfort women” who were forced to serve Japanese soldiers sexually in World War II, easing tensions between the two large economic partners and U.S. allies.

The agreement announced Monday includes support services for the women, using ¥1 billion ($8.3 million) in Japanese government funds, Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida said.

An earlier Japanese arrangement to help the women in the 1990s and 2000s involved the use of private donations, but Seoul had called for direct state-funded compensation for the women. In addition, Seoul had called on Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to personally apologize for the women’s treatment, which he did as part of Monday’s deal.

The issue of “comfort women”—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—has long strained relations between the two neighbors and caused concern in Washington.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said after the agreement was announced, “We must not let this problem drag on into the next generation.”

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