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The plight of ‘comfort women’

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We've run a depressingly large number of stories on WVON recently about women worldwide who find themselves used as sexual commodities, ask as prostitutes or brides to be bought and sold.

But Asiaone has an equally disturbing reminder today that this is hardly a new situation, for sale with a story about the many thousands of women forced into sexual slavery for the Japanese army during World War two.

There are some real horror stories here, with the victims, ironically nicknamed 'comfort women' living post war lives of stigmatisation, poverty and ill health.

And with many of them now in their seventies and eighties, time is running out for the Japanese government to issue a formal apology, something the women themselves have been campaigning for in weekly demonstrations since 1992.

Goodness knows 'sorry' hardy seems adequate under the circumstances and is inevitably too little too late, but its absence is a continued refusal to recognise the suffering and humanity of these women. Luckily, the signs are that Tokyo might be about to take long overdue moves to rectify this situation, resolving compensation claims as well as taking political responsibility.

Lets hope so.

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