By Jun Ji-hye
Saenuri Party chairman Hwang Woo-yea urged Japan Thursday to reconsider its denials of past atrocities, saying Tokyo was only temporarily dodging its responsibilities.
Japanese Prime Minister Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda and other officials have claimed in recent days that there is no evidence of Tokyo’s practice of forcing Korean women into sexual slavery during its 1910-45 colonial rule of the peninsula.
“Comments made by Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda and former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, refusing to acknowledge the practice of comfort woman, hinder efforts to maintain peace and spread common prosperity in Asia,” Hwang said during a meeting of the party’s Supreme Council.
On Tuesday, Abe said his Liberal Democratic Party would seek to revise a 1993 statement that admitted the practice of forced sex slavery.
Stressing that United Nations recognized Japan’s legal responsibility over the matter in 1996 and 2003, Hwang hit Noda and others for passing historical spats down to the next generation.
“This issue would not be swept away by temporary measures. Seoul will maintain resolute attitudes and continue on its way to establish an everlasting peace and prosperity,” he added.