Protesters wearing masks depicting South Korean President Park Geun-Hye  and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe hold up placards during an anti-Japanese rally in Seoul yesterday.

South Korean President Park Geun-hye said the emotional issue of “comfort women”, who were forced into prostitution at Japanese wartime brothels, would be central at this weekend’s bilateral summit and key to stable ties with Japan. Park and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe are set to hold their first two-way talks since taking office, an effort to mend ties chilled by what South Korea sees as repeated failures by leaders in Tokyo to properly atone for wartime atrocities. In an interview published in the Asahi Shimbun daily yesterday, Park said efforts by Japan to resolve long-festering issues such as the “comfort women”, as the mostly Korean women forced into prostitution are know, was needed for a “stable relationship”. “For that to happen, more than anything, some kind of progress on the important issue of victims of the Japanese military comfort women (system) is essential,” Park was quoted as telling the Asahi in written replies to
questions.