A key member of the U.S. Congress who is pressing the Japanese government to issue a thorough apology for the wartime “comfort women” system urged Tokyo on Thursday to view the matter as a human rights issue, not as a political spat between nations.
“The comfort women issue is not one of pitting Japan against South Korea. There are fewer than 100 former comfort women survivors. Japan needs to offer a formal and unequivocal apology and memorialize the issue in its textbooks,” Mike Honda, a Democratic congressman from California’s Silicon Valley area, said during a telephone news conference.
