High school student raises awareness of wartime sex slavery for Americans
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Kim Ye-na / Yonhap
By Jhoo Dong-chan
A Boston high school senior has set up a non-profit organization, Nabi: Justice For Comfort Women, to promote awareness of the women who were forced into sex slavery by Imperial Japan in the latter years of its occupation of Korea (1910-45).
Korea-born Kim Ye-na, who immigrated to the U.S. with her parents when she was in 7th grade, established the organization with her friends at New South High School in Boston two years ago, with her English teacher Marie-Kate Kasper and 13 members participating in her cause.
“The organization faced strong opposition from Japanese students in the school, but it is nothing compared to what the comfort women had been through during the Japanese occupation,” said Kim.
“We will continue our struggle to educate more Americans on the comfort women issue.”
Kim’s organization, Nabi, hosted a movie night at her school, screening "Spirits' Homecoming" last month. Released in February, the movie illustrates the story of two teenage girls who were kidnapped and sexually enslaved by Japanese soldiers during wartime.
Students, parents and teachers who attended the screening have agreed that the wartime sex slavery issue should be addressed as violation of fundamental human rights, she added.
“A Japanese student complained about the movie via email,” Kim was quoted as saying.
“The student said, ‘Why won’t those old ladies just shut up?’ I just felt pity for those that might be ignorant due to a lack of history education. I will continue to let more people know about the issue.”
Kim decided to form the organization when she was a freshman. She participated in the school’s speech contest, speaking about wartime sex slavery.
Kim said she was very surprised by the fact that not only her fellow students, but also many of her teachers did not know about the issue.
“I was very shocked. The comfort women issue is one of universal resentment among Koreans but was rather new to people here,” she said.
As her organization’s first project, Kim carried out a project publishing and selling illustrated books about the wartime sex slavery in the downtown Boston area. Over 200 illustrators applied, of which Kim worked with 20 Korean illustrators on the project.
She donated all the proceeds from the sale of the books to The House of Sharing, a home for former comfort women in Gwangju, Gyeonggi Province.