TOKYO: Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida held talks with his South Korean counterpart on Sunday in a bid to mend ties strained by a territorial dispute and a feud over “comfort women” forced to work in Japan’s wartime military brothels.

The fraught relations are complicating efforts to boost security cooperation between Japan and South Korea, two of the United States’ main Asian allies, as the region copes with an unpredictable North Korea and an assertive China.

South Korea says Japan has not properly atoned for its wartime past, including its role in forcing Korean women into prostitution at military brothels, while Japan says the matter of compensation for comfort women has already been settled.

Both China and Korea suffered under Japanese rule, with parts of China occupied in the 1930s and Korea colonized from 1910 to 1945.

South Korean President Park Geun-hye told the Washington Post this month negotiations on “comfort women” were “in the final stage”.

Published in Dawn, June 22nd, 2015

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