How time flies

One hundred years ago, on February 1, the Japanese government established the governor-general position in occupied Korea. This set up the imperial rule of Korea by Japan, a 40 year occupation that ended with Japanese surrender at the end of WWII and the division of Korea into two nations.

During that period of time, thousands of Koreans were forced into slave labor, women forced to work as "comfort women" for the Japanese military.

North Korea's Committee for Investigation into the Damage Done by the Japanese Imperialists During Their Occupation of Korea issued a statement last Thursday urging Japan to settle the issue. That in itself seems a reasonable request, though it doesn't elaborate on how Japan would make amends, and in fact, the statement says "the crimes of the Japanese imperialists, the long-time sworn enemy, can never be erased even after centuries." This tells me that, like so much in North Korea, this is little more than proselytizing rhetoric aimed and keeping the North Korean people angered at another people.

Strangely, the article makes no mention of the North Korean practice of kidnapping Japanese women and forcing them to train insurgents, as well as beating, raping, and forcing marriage on them. Strange how little things like that get lost.