The 1242th Wednesday protest was staged on August 3rd in front of the Japanese Embassy. On this day, events in the protests included group chants regarding the necessity of Japan’s proper apology, performances by bands to commemorate comfort women who’ve passed away and free speeches were given from citizens.
The comfort women issue has risen above shore on December 28th, 2015 when the Korean and Japanese governments made a final settlement on the issue. This infuriated the comfort women who have been starting Wednesday protests from 1992 to plead the Korean government to listen to their opinions. However, since the government did not take the comfort women’s opinions into account but made a final agreement regarding the comfort women issue, the comfort women and their supporters added more passion in their Wednesday protests.
On the day of the 1242th protest, Mihyang Yoon, the standing representative of the Korean Council for Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan emphatically claimed that “today is the 25th Anniversary of the day the late Haksoon Kim broke silence and told the public about the harm done to her when she was a sex slave of the Japanese."
She also stated that "the late Mrs. Kim never let go of hope that the comfort women will recover their rights and receive a sincere apology from the assailants."
After Mihyang Yoon’s speech, citizens, including a range of teenagers, college students and adults gave their free speeches regarding the comfort women issue. For instance, Yoshiko Wuema, a member from the Peace Travel Group Connecting Jeju Island and Okinawa stated that "the comfort women issue is a problem which can't be resolved by money, and that the Prime Minister Shinzo Abe needs to apologize himself."
I conducted an interview with Soyoung Oh, a student from Muhak Girls' High School aged 17 who gave a free speech on this protest.
Q: Why do you think the comfort women issue is a problem?
A: The direct victims are the comfort women. However, the Korean government did not take their opinions and desires into account at all, but made a final settlement with the Japanese government. This act reflects the Korean government’s ignorance and disrespect for the comfort women’s rights.
Q: What motivated you to give a free speech?
A: I initially didn’t have much knowledge about the comfort women issue. However, after I researched about the settlement regarding this issue by Korea and Japan, I was enraged about the ignorance of the Korean government and therefore wanted to express my opinions towards this issue.
Q: How do you think this issue will be resolved?
A: I believe that the only solution of this issue is Japan giving a sincere apology to the comfort women. Because the Japanese militaries who treated the women as sex slaves were the assailants of this issue, I believe that Prime Minister Abe needs to give an apology as a representative.
Q: What effort do you think needs to be added in order to solve this issue?
A: I simply think the Wednesday protests need to continue. I think the Japanese Prime Minister Abe thinks we are going to quit our effort because of the money he gave for the resolution of this issue. However, like Mihyang Yoon stated earlier, we are never going to give up in recovering the comfort women’s rights.
The 25th anniversary of the rise of the comfort women issue could be celebrated by around 1,000 citizens because these citizens had such uniform beliefs: that the comfort women issue is not resolved yet, and that they will never give up supporting these women.
Yenah Jang
Grade 11
Chadwick International School