CNN in an article on March 10 said J. Mark Ramseyer's paper about "comfort women" faces an international backlash for distorting history. The photo shows surviving victim Lee Yong-soo touching a statue of a young girl symbolizing the victims at an unveiling ceremony near the former religious facility Joseon Shingung in Seoul's Jung-gu District. (Korea.net DB)

By Lee Jihye and Yoon Hee Young

CNN says J. Mark Ramseyer, an American professor at Harvard Law School, faces an international backlash for his paper that claims women forced into sexual slavery by Japan were "willing prostitutes."

The U.S.-based network on March 10 said the professor is the target of global protest after publishing an academic paper saying victims of sexual slavery by Japan before and during World War II chose to pursue prostitution and were not forced.

The report presented specific cases in South and North Korea and China in which the women were never given a choice.

On the "a tense topic" between Japan and Korea, CNN said, "Back in 1993, Japan issued the Kono Statement, which acknowledged the role Japan played in recruiting comfort women who lived in misery at comfort stations under a coercive atmosphere, but in recent years, it has made efforts to suppress the history surrounding 'comfort women.'"

"As the United States has stated many times, the trafficking of women for sexual purposes is an egregious violation of human rights, including by the Japanese military during World War II," CNN quoted a State Department statement to the network as saying.

The article also mentioned the conflict between Korea and Japan over the latter's 2014 investigation into the Kono Statement under Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and opposition in Korea over the 2015 bilateral agreement on the comfort women.

shaadiya1223@korea.kr