Taiwan boycotts Japanese comic

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- Taiwanese lawmakers have called for the boycott of a Japanese comic for depicting Taiwan's comfort women as sex volunteers during World War Two.

In the comic, On Taiwan, Japanese author Kobayashi Yoshinori cited two prominent Taiwanese businessmen, one of whom works as a senior advisor to the president, as saying that "all the (Taiwan) comfort women were voluntary," the Taipei Times reported.

Taiwanese women's groups have begun a petition to boycott the book and are demanding the comfort women issue be explained accurately in educational publications.

"It's only a comic but it might be used by many, especially the younger generation, as a convenient way to learn about history. And that's just not acceptable as it is full of distortion," Ko Su-lun, executive-general of the Taipei Women's Rescue Foundation was quoted as saying.

Ko said the group was afraid surviving comfort women would be hurt by the accounts.

The businessmen depicted in the comic have refused to confirm that they were correctly quoted in the book.

People First Party legislators have demanded the pair apologize for their comments, and called for President Chen Shui-bian to remove his advisor.

The Taipei Times quoted Wang Ching-feng, a lawyer who has led a campaign to pressure the Japanese government to apologize to comfort women, as saying some 360,000 Asian women were forced or tricked into sex slavery to serve the three million Japanese soldiers during the war.

They were forced to have sex with 29 Japanese soldiers per day on average, Wang said.

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