A group of women who said they were forced to provide sex for the Japanese military in the 1930s and 1940s angrily accused the government Wednesday of trying to suppress the truth about Japan's past human rights violations.
"Why were the women taken and the blossom of their youth ripped apart?" one South Korean cried out before a symposium audience of about 500 people."You have ignored us for years, but you can never ignore us again," another said before being escorted from a stage where women from North and South Korea, the Philippines, the Netherlands, China and Taiwan recounted their experiences as so-called "comfort women" for the Japanese army.
Historians say up to 200,000 women were forced to work in brothels in Asia and the Pacific region serving Japanese soldiers and civilians working for the military.
Japan admitted last year that it was involved in using the women, but it maintains all went willingly. Japan's stance has elicited bitter accusations from women who have kept silent for 50 years.
Each woman who spoke broke down in tears as she told her story.
After North Korean Kim Yang-Sih finished speaking, a group of South Korean women rushed onto the stage and embraced her, kissing and crying.
Wan Ai Hua, a Chinese woman who said she was beaten and forced to have sex with Japanese soldiers in China, collapsed while speaking and had to be taken out of the meeting.
Although the details varied, all the women shared certain experiences. All claimed they were required to have sex with several men daily. One woman said she had sex with between 30 and 50 men every day.
They told of hiding from military recruiters who entered villages or prisoner of war camps in Japanese-controlled areas to select women to provide sexual favors.