Photo credit by SFAC
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The city of San Francisco will soon have the nation’s first memorial to so-called “comfort women,” of women who were forced into sex slavery by the Japanese Army in World War II.
The San Francisco Chronicle reports that on Feb. 6, the San Francisco Arts Commission gave final approval to a planned memorial to be located in the city’s Chinatown.
The memorial is being funded by the Comfort Women Justice Coalition and will be created by sculptor Steven Whyte. It depicts a trio of women with linked hands as a fourth woman looks on and is set to be installed in September.
Survivors and their families have long argued for a memorial, saying Japan has never fully apologized for its behavior during the war. However, some Japanese and Japanese-American people have disputed the claim that women were enslaved.