g.o.d‘s Kim Tae Woo has agreed to partake in the fundraising promotions for an Exhibition Hall to be established in New York, commemorating South Korean comfort women.
During his visit to the Korean American Association of Greater New York, Kim Taewoo met with the publicity committee working towards erecting an exhibition hall in the Museum of Jewish Heritage. The meeting was successful, with Kim Tae Woo appointed as a new member of the committee.
Kim Tae Woo has expressed his gratitude and commitment to the cause, saying, “As a publicity committee member, I will accept full responsibility and diligently take part in fundraising for the construction project.”
The issue of South Korean and Chinese comfort women during World War 2 has remained a sensitive topic within the Korean community. Between 1932 and 1945, it is estimated that the Japanese Imperial Army had forced up to 200,000 women and young girls into becoming sex slaves, making it one of the biggest cases of human trafficking. A majority of the women were either abducted, obtained through deceit, or occasionally, sold for desperate measures. Statistics also show that many were in their late teenage years, although some were as young as 12 years old.
There are many ex-comfort women alive today, who have previously been too afraid to speak out and demand reparations for the horrendous annihilation of their rights as human beings, inflicted upon them by the Japanese army. However, in recent years, more and more light has been shed upon the unspoken war crimes committed by the Japanese.
Protest rallies and demands have been made towards the Japanese government, who have responded with loose apologies and a statement claiming that comfort women were part of a process that “was a fact of those times,” and that the context of modern times cannot be applied.
However, there are consistent efforts by the Korean, Chinese, and Australian communities, among others, to gain the proper acknowledgement they desire: the act that the issue of comfort women is not merely a political dispute but a breach of human rights that can only be resolved through the acknowledgement that there actually was a breach of human rights.
Source: Dongpo News, Amnesty International and The Diplomat
