On August 14th 1991, testimonies on Japan’s wartime sex slavery were first revealed. In recognition of this day, the first “Comfort Women’s Day” will be observed on the 1087th Comfort Women Wednesday Demonstration. NGOs plan to stage protests in front of Japanese embassies in the US, Japan, Germany, Canada, Australia, Taiwan, and the Philippines. The “Comfort Women’s Day” is also known as “Kim Hak-soon Day,” named after the first Korean woman who testified her experiences as a sex slave. This day was designated at the 11th Asian Solidarity Conference on Comfort Women last December. A daughter of an independence activist, Kim Hak-soon was forced to become a sex slave for the Japanese soldiers at the age of 17. She died at the age of 75 on December 16th 1997. “Never receive help from the Asian Women’s Fund” were her last words. She even donated her entire fortune of KRW 17 million.
The event is organized by the Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan which will host a relevant international symposium on August 13th. Victims including Hah Sang-sook (a Chinese resident), Kim Bok-dong, and Kil Won-ok, and the peace activist Tanaka Nobuyuki whose father served in the Japanese military during WWII will deliver special speeches at the symposium at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Jongno. Other speakers include: Aitani Kunio of the Japanese Bar Association (Victims’ legal battles and the progress), Yang Hyun-ah of Seoul National University Law school (Remaining legal options and the path to recovery), and Katherine Barraclough, the East Asia Campaigner at Amnesty International (Wartime sexual violence and female solidarity),
