A U.N. committee on discrimination urged Japan on Thursday to adopt a victim-centered approach toward "comfort women," the women and girls forced to provide sex at Japanese military brothels before and during World War II, to ensure a lasting solution to the issue.
The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination said in a report that government efforts to address the issue did "not take a fully victim-centered approach, that the surviving 'comfort women' were not adequately consulted" and that a 2015 agreement with the government of South Korea meant to permanently settle the matter "did not provide unequivocal responsibility for the human rights violations committed against these women."
The Japanese delegation told the committee that both the Japanese and South Korean governments agreed the 2015 settlement resolved the matter "finally and irreversibly."