S. Korea summons Japanese rightist accused of defaming sex slaves

SEOUL, Sept. 5 (Xinhua) -- South Korean prosecutors on Wednesday summoned a Japanese right-wing activist accused of defaming Korean women who were forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese military during World War II.

The move came after surviving wartime sex slaves sued 47-year- old Nobuyuki Suzuki last month for defamation for tying a wooden stake to a symbolic statue of a young Korean woman, a monument to the victims of forced sexual slavery.

The statue, erected last year opposite the Japanese Embassy in central Seoul, has drawn protests from Japanese politicians and rightists.

The wooden post read "Takeshima is Japanese territory,"in reference to a set of South Korea-controlled islets at the center of the decades-long territorial dispute between the two Asian neighbors. The islets are known here as Dokdo.

Prosecutors have requested Suzuki, who currently resides in Japan, to appear for questioning on Sept. 18 and plan to seek his extradition in cooperation with the Japanese authorities if he snubs the summon.

South Korea has long demanded proper compensation for the former sex slaves, often euphemistically called "comfort women," while Japan says the issue was resolved with a 1965 treaty that normalized their relations after 35 years of Japan's brutal colonial rule.

In a testament to strained diplomatic ties over the recently reignited dispute over the rocky islets, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda recently said there is no evidence showing the sex slaves were coerced into sexual slavery.

The remark, which apparently challenges Japan's 1993 statement acknowledging the forcible nature of the recruitment of the comfort women, was strongly protested by South Korea. Enditem

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