Seoul to set up foundation for colonial forced laborers

The Korean government will establish a foundation to support victims of Japan's forced labor during that country's colonial rule of the Korean peninsula and their bereaved families, officials of a committee handling the issue said Tuesday.

The government has earmarked 1 billion won ($899,361) of budget to set up the foundation around early next year, with the budget proposal to be submitted to the National Assembly next month for approval, according to the forced laborer investigation committee under the Prime Minister's Office.

Historians say millions of Korean men were forcibly drafted into the Japanese workforce during its colonial rule from 1910-45, and more than 200,000 women from Korea and other Asian nations were sexually enslaved to serve wartime Japanese soldiers.

The new foundation will be in charge of leading diverse projects to remember the victims, take care of bereaved families and raise public awareness on the matter, among other things, while the existing committee will lead other works requiring special expertise, such as the excavation of remains, the committee said.

Along with the budget for the establishment, the Seoul government agreed with the committee to pay around 500 million won each year to help its operation, according to the committee.

The government subsidy is in line with Korean law which stipulates that the government financially supports any foundations tasked with commemorating victims of forced labor during the colonial era and operating relevant historical projects.

The country's top steelmaker POSCO also decided to make a donation worth 10 billion won for the foundation, with 10 other local firms including the state-run Korea Electric Power Corp. and Korea Railroad Corp. reviewing their contributions, according to the committee. The firms got started using war reparations from Japan.

"The new organization is modeled after Germany's 'Foundation Remembrance, Responsibility, and Future' that carries out diverse projects in remembrance of the victims of socialist injustice," a committee official said.

The German foundation, set up in 2000 with government funds, paid compensation to around 1.66 million people in 98 countries including Poland and Austria who suffered from forced labor during World War II, as "an expression of the continuing political and moral responsibility for the wrongs committed in the name of the National Socialism," according to the foundation's Web site.

"But things are totally different, as the Seoul foundation would not earn any support from Japan that is supposed to compensate for its wartime wrongdoings," the official added.

The Japanese government as well as the companies that used forced laborers have refused to make any compensation, saying all issues regarding its colonial rule, including sex slavery and monetary reparations, were covered by a 1965 package agreement that normalized relations between the two nations. (Yonhap)