Kim Bok-dong, a 88-year-old Korean woman who was held as a sex slave by the Japanese Imperial Army during World War II, attended a ceremony to unveil a monument to the so-called comfort women in Glendale, California, Tuesday.

According to the Los Angeles Times and Yonhap News on Tuesday, Glendale dropped unveiled a metal statue that is to become a lasting testament to the pain and suffering endured by an estimated 200,000 sex slaves from Korea, China, Indonesia and other occupied countries during the war.

Kim was among a crowd of about 300 people who witnessed the unveiling of the statue at Central Park of a girl in a Korean traditional dress sitting alone on a chair next to an unoccupied chair, with a bird perched on her left shoulder.

After the unveiling ceremony, Kim, who wore a Korean traditional white jacket and black skirt, sat on the empty chair next to the girl and held her hand.

Kim, who traveled from Korea to Los Angeles to share her struggle for justice, received attention from U.S. news media.

“I want you to take good care of this statue for many people to look at it and be reminded of our history,” she was quoted as saying by Yonhap News.

Her remark apparently referred to an incident in which a Japanese ultrarightist had surreptitiously tied a wooden stake with the phrase, “Dokdo islands belong to Japan,” to the statue of a comfort girl in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul. Dokdo has been under the effective control of South Korea.

Asked if it was true that the Japanese government mobilized comfort women methodically, she replied through a translator: “So many girls were taken as sex slaves for the Japanese army. Who else could do so but the Japanese government?”

To a question by a CNN reporter about what she would say if she met the Japanese prime minister here, she said: “If he is in my sight, I will urge him again to apologize for their crimes committed in the Japanese imperial era.

“Even after my death, I hope the statue will serve as a textbook for the future generations of America to get to know that an unfair and bitter incident like comfort women happened in the past,” she said.

On Monday, Kim had met with several survivors of the Holocaust under a special program for her at the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles.

The statue had been strongly opposed by Japanese nationalists who, despite the historical records, insist comfort women were acting of their own accord as prostitutes. A group of opponents, based mostly in Japan, sent thousands of emails protesting the monument, but to no avail.

Glendale council members acknowledged political pressure but defied the deniers.

“Today, the city of Glendale stands united with its Korean population. It stands united with the truth,” Councilwoman Laura Friedman said.

The metal statue in Glendale is a replica of the one in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul. It was made by the same Korean couple who created the statue in Seoul.

There are a handful of comfort women memorials scattered across the U.S. but Glendale’s is the first on the West Coast, and also the first replica outside Korea of the statue in Seoul.

Kim is one of the few surviving Korean comfort women. She was 15 when she was forced into sexual slavery before and during World War II. 

By Chun Sung-woo
(swchun@heraldcorp.com)