"Career Guidance for Prostitution?" Police Investigate Insults Against Comfort Women Victims... Even President Lee Calls It "Absurd Defamation"

Head of National Action for the Abolition of the Comfort Women Law Booked
Police Also Investigating Three Additional Participants

The police have launched an investigation into Mr. A, the head of the "National Action for the Abolition of the Comfort Women Law," who has insulted victims of the Japanese military's comfort women with inflammatory language both domestically and abroad, and damaged the Peace Monument, a statue commemorating the victims.

Photo on Mr A's SNS. Mr A's SNS

Nationwide Insults Such as "Comfort Women Are Prostitutes"... Investigation Launched into Civic Group Leader

On January 6, the Yangsan Police Station in South Gyeongsang Province announced that Mr. A had been booked on charges of defamation under the Act on Promotion of Information and Communications Network Utilization and Information Protection, violation of the Assembly and Demonstration Act, and property damage. The police also identified three additional individuals who participated in Mr. A's activities and are investigating them. It is reported that the police began a full-scale investigation after receiving a complaint related to Mr. A's case on September 24 last year.

In October, after police blocked Mr. A's protest to remove the statue in front of a school in Yangsan and Seoul, Mr. A posted photos of the school-where the protest was planned-on his social networking service (SNS), along with comments such as, "Are you setting up a statue of a prostitute on campus to provide career guidance for prostitution?" and "A grotesque symbol of fraud," thereby insulting the victims. Mr. A also posted a photo in front of the Asahi Shimbun, the Japanese newspaper that brought the comfort women issue to public attention, holding a banner that read, "Stop the comfort women fraud now!"

In addition, Mr. A has repeatedly staged protests across the country near statues of the Peace Monument, demanding their removal. During these protests, he has denied historical facts related to the comfort women, labeled them as "sex workers," and placed masks with the word "removal" on the statues, actions that have drawn criticism for being hateful. Notably, in November, he caused controversy by using a microphone and loudspeaker to demand the removal of the Peace Monument in front of the main gate of a high school in Chuncheon. This school was the first in the province to erect a Peace Monument on its campus in 2019.

President Lee: "Absurd Defamation of the Deceased" Criticized

President Lee Jae-myung. Photo by Yonhap News

In response, President Lee Jae-myung strongly criticized the incident, calling it "absurd defamation of the deceased." On January 6, President Lee shared a link to an online article about Mr. A and others being booked and investigated by the police on X (formerly Twitter), expressing his criticism.