‘Reverse this disgraceful act’: Japanese nationalists call on Shinzo Abe to kill himself in shame after sex slave apology

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Japanese nationalists protest in front of the official residence of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Photo: AFP

Published: 6:26pm, 29 Dec 2015Updated: 6:26pm, 29 Dec 2015

200 Japanese nationalists lashed out Tuesday at an agreement to settle a dispute with South Korea about wartime sex slaves, with some calling on Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to kill himself in shame.

Japan Monday offered a “heartfelt apology” and a one-billion yen (US$8.3 million) payment to surviving South Korean “comfort women” forced into Japanese military brothels during the second world war.

Abe, himself a nationalist who came to power three years ago vowing to revitalise Japan’s economy and revise its war-renouncing constitution, has praised the agreement as heralding a “new era” for relations.

Ties between Tokyo and Seoul have long been soured by the sex slave issue, a legacy of Japan’s colonial rule over the Korean peninsula and of the war.

The apology from Japan’s prime minister Shinzo Abe and a pledge of more than $8 million sealed a breakthrough deal on a decades-long impasse with South Korea over Korean women forced into Japanese military-run brothels. Photo: AFP

Abe told reporters in Tokyo on Monday that Japan has apologised and expressed its remorse, but added future Japanese generations should not have to keep on doing so.

“We should never allow this problem to drag on into the next generation,” he said, echoing remarks he made marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War Two on August 15. “From now on, Japan and South Korea will enter a new era.”