Yohei Kono, a former speaker of Japan’s Home of Representatives, the decrease chamber of parliament, died on Monday on the age of 89, folks near him stated Wednesday.
Kono issued a landmark assertion in 1993 on “consolation ladies” — ladies who suffered underneath Japan’s army brothel system earlier than and through World Warfare II.
A local of Kanagawa Prefecture, he was a number one dove inside the ruling Liberal Democratic Social gathering and championed steady ties with neighbors of Japan, together with China and South Korea.
He additionally served as LDP president when the social gathering was an opposition social gathering, and as overseas minister.
As chief Cupboard secretary in 1993 underneath the administration of then-Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa, Kono issued the landmark assertion, which expressed the Japanese authorities’s “honest apologies and regret” after the difficulty of consolation ladies emerged as a serious diplomatic and political problem.
Some conservatives contend that the assertion inspired subsequent calls for from South Korea over wartime points.
