SKorea: Should ‘comfort women’ be called ‘sex slaves’?

Original article in Korean is at this link.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (외교통상부) is considering a plan to change the English name of the Japanese military “comfort women” to “sex slaves”. But Korean Council for Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan (한국정신대문제대책협의회), a group composed of the victimized women, opposes the plan and supports the continued use of the phrase “comfort women”.

Ministry authorities announced on the 16th that “as to the issue of using the expression ‘sex slave’ for the Japanese military comfort women in our own language, we have no plans… we are merely considering a plan to change the international expression from ‘so called comfort women’ to ‘sex slave’.”

The issue of changing the expression for comfort women arose recently, when US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton reportedly referred to the Japanese military comfort women as “enforced sex slaves”. On the 13th the full foreign affairs and trade commission of the National Assembly issued its reply, through Democratic United Party Representative Shim Jae-gwon, that “we ask whether there may be a need to the change the expression to sex slave.”

However, the Council argued that “we must continue to use the expression comfort women, as used by the Japanese military, to expose the reality of Japanese war crimes,” and the expression in Korean remains unchanged.

An official with the Ministry said that “we believe that the opinions of the victims are very important.”