The Statue of Peace, Sonyeosang in Korean and Shōjo-zō in Japanese, also known as the Comfort Woman Statue, stands in Seoul facing the Japanese embassy waiting for an official apology and recognition for the crimes that happened to them during WW2.
The term ‘comfort women’ refers to the hundreds of thousands of women abducted from their homes by the Japanese Imperial Army and forced into sexual slavery during the war. To this day, the Japanese government did not condemn these actions, never apologized, and no one was held accountable for these horrible actions.
The statue stands in the same place where the Wednesday demonstrations have occurred since 1992, organized by The Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan. It is the longest-running protest on a single theme in history. They demand the recognition of the Japanese government on these crimes, justice, compensation to the victims, documenting the truth, and creating a memorial and museum for the victims.
Kim Seo-Kyung and Kim Eun-sung designed the memorial, a bronze sitting statue of a girl, wearing traditional cloth, looking forward at the embassy, waiting for her closure. The bird on her shoulder represents peace. Next to her is an empty seat. The statue was unveiled on 14 December 2011, the 1,000th day of the protest.
More than 20 copies of this statue and tens of other memorials stand on almost every continent, from Australia to Berlin. The mission is to commemorate the comfort women and make sure their stories are not forgotten. Almost every memorial caused controversy with the Japanese authorities, who tried using every possible method to remove them. Sometimes they were successful, and the statue got removed (like in Berlin) or relocated to a less central location (like in Atlanta).
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