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S. Korean man sets fire to himself in front of Japan's embassy in Seoul

Xinhua, August 12, 2015 Adjust font size:

A South Korean man in his 80s set fire to himself in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul amid the ongoing rally for the victims of comfort women, a euphemism for sex slaves coerced into Japan's military brothels during World War II.

The 81-year-old man set a flame to himself at around 12:40 a.m. (0340 GMT) Wednesday in front of the Japanese embassy in central Seoul, according to local media reports.

When the man burned himself, hundreds of civic group activists and the comfort women victims were staging a regular rally, hosted by the Korean Council for Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan, in front of the embassy.

The advocate group for the sex slavery victims has held a rally every Wednesday in front of the embassy since Jan. 8, 1992, calling for apology and reparation from the Japanese government.

The man, who came to Seoul from the southern city of Gwangju to join the rally, was taken to a near hospital for treatment.

The rally was staged in a larger scale ahead of the 70th anniversary of the Korean Peninsula's liberation from the 1910-45 Japanese colonial rule.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was expected to issue his statement on Japan's past aggression and wartime atrocities Friday. Some media reports estimated that Abe could not apologize for the colonization and the forced recruitment of Korean women for sex enslavement. Endi