Female Asian activists on Saturday denounced a planned revote on a Philippine House of Representatives resolution that called on Japan to formally apologize for its role in forcing close to 200 Filipino women to work as sex slaves in World War II and to compensate the victims.
Activists from Taiwan, Indonesia, North and South Korea, Japan, China and the Philippines, as well as the Netherlands — all members of the International Solidarity Council for Redress of WWII Victims by Japan, or ISCR — told a news conference in Manila the move smacks of "dirty play" and buckling under pressure from Japan.
The resolution was unanimously passed March 11 by the lower house's Foreign Affairs Committee and was due to be submitted to a plenary session for the approval of the whole Congress.
But barely a month later, committee chairman Rep. Antonio Cuenco said it would be returned to the committee after the Japanese Embassy pointed out that only three members of the 55-member committee voted on the resolution when at least 12 are needed to make a quorum.