First `comfort woman' to acknowledge the past dies

The first South Korean woman to identify herself openly as a former sex slave or "comfort woman" to Japanese soldiers during World War Two has died aged seventy-four.

The woman, Kim Hak-soon, described in 1991 how at the age of seventeen she was abducted by Japanese soldiers and forced to serve as a prostitute at a military-run brothel.

Her testimony helped to break silence on the issue and encouraged other former comfort women to join together to demand compensation from the Japanese government.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service