[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 4]
[House]
[Page 5288]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                             COMFORT WOMEN

  (Mr. PASCRELL asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. PASCRELL. Mr. Speaker, as the United States continues to work 
with Japan to promote peace and prosperity throughout the Asia-Pacific 
region and the broader global community, it is my hope that Prime 
Minister Abe's visit next week will lay the foundation for healing and 
humble reconciliation by addressing the historical issue of the comfort 
women.
  I look forward to hearing from the Prime Minister for Japan is a 
close friend and ally, as is South Korea. We want to encourage our 
close friends and allies to communicate and to foster an ability to 
work together productively.
  That is why I am proud to cosponsor resolutions in the United States 
Congress to urge the Japanese Government to formally acknowledge and 
apologize for their Imperial Military's coercion of young women into 
sexual slavery during the thirties and forties. The recognition of 
these events by the Japanese Government, through the report released 
last year on the Kono Statement, takes a step backward in taking full 
responsibility for the immeasurable pain and incurable wounds suffered 
by the comfort women.
  As a member of the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, I will continue 
to work every day to ensure that our children and our children's 
children will inherit a world where these types of atrocities are a 
thing of the past.
  Mr. Speaker, Mike Honda, who will be speaking in a little while, has 
kept this hope alive.

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