A South Korean woman who had been forced to work in a Japanese wartime military brothel said Japan lacked honor for failing to attend a South Korean court on Wednesday as it began hearing a civil case brought against its government by a group of victims. “I am a living proof of history,” said Lee Yong-soo, the 91-year-old survivor, her voice quaking with emotion as she addressed a news conference held near the courthouse, before proceedings began. Reminders of Japan’s 1910-45 colonization of the Korean peninsula are inflammatory for both sides.
