South Korea and Japan will hold a meeting this week to discuss follow-up measures related to a foundation launched to help Korean women sexually abused by Japan during its colonial rule of the peninsula decades ago, the foreign ministry said Monday.
The meeting will be held in Seoul on Tuesday between Chung Byung-won, director-general of the South Korean foreign ministry's Northeast Asian Affairs Bureau, and his Japanese counterpart, Kenji Kanasugi, according to the ministry.
The meeting will mark the first time for both sides to get together after the foundation started its work last month by opening its office in central Seoul.
The "Reconciliation and Healing" foundation came into being under a deal reached in December aimed at helping the victims, euphemistically called comfort women. Tokyo promised to contribute 1 billion yen ($9.8 million) to the foundation.
"Both sides will discuss follow-up measures to the December comfort women deal and other issues of mutual concern," the ministry said in a press release.
High on the agenda will be when the promised money will be transfered and how to use it.
This comes amid persistent controversy over how much Japan would be involved in the foundation's work and whether the money was promised in return for the Seoul government's cooperation in removing the statue of a girl that has been placed before the Japanese Embassy to symbolize the suffering of the comfort women.
The government has said that the foundation will use the money for its intended purpose -- healing the scars of the victims -- and that Seoul doesn't have a say in removing the statute since it was set up by a civic group.
The Dec. 28 deal was hailed by the international community as a step in the right direction given that the comfort women issue has been a long-standing obstacle to ties between the two neighboring countries.
Still, it has been drawing flak from some victims and civic groups who have accused the government of striking a deal lacking Japan's acknowledgment of its legal responsibility. They also said the agreement was reached without prior consultation with the victims.
Historians estimate that up to 200,000 women, mostly from Korea, were forced to work in front-line brothels for Japanese troops during World War II. Forty South Korean victims, mostly in their late 80s, are currently known to be alive. (Yonhap)
