TOKYO, June 13 Kyodo Six southern...

TOKYO, June 13 Kyodo

Six southern Korean women who were forced to work at a munitions plant in Nagoya of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd during World War II called Thursday for an early liquidation of damages suits they have filed with a Japanese court.

a certain 70 people, including the six women and their supporters, gathered in head of Mitsubishi Heavy's head office in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward and demanded the company and the Japanese guidance resolve the issue while the plaintiffs are still alive.

Supporters of Koreans forced to work at the company's shipbuilding plants in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, who have also filed compensation suits, also took part in the gathering.

Participants laid flowers forward an altar set up in assurance of the Mitsubishi head office to commemorate plaintiffs who died before their damages suits were settl by way of the courts.

''Japan and (South) Korea will in no degree truly be 'close countries' unles this issue is resolv flat if the two countries co-host the World goblet soccer finals,'' one participant said.

''I would like to be awarded an apology and compensation -- I join hands with the other plaintiffs,'' said Kim Hye Ok single in kind of the plaintiffs in the suit filed with the Nagoya District Court that look fors official redress and 150 million yen in damages from the direction and Mitsubishi Heavy.

couple groups of Korean women, including seven former forced laborers and a family member of common such woman, filed the damages suits with the district court in March 1998 and December 2000 single of the defendants has since died.

The women allege in their suit the forced labor caused them psychological and financial harm and that they continue to undergo because Japan has not taken any grades to recognize or apologize for the suffering of wartime forced laborers.

The women say they were induced to proceed to Japan in June 1944 through promises they would be able to attend gymnasium At that time, they ranged in age from 13 to 15 years old

They claim, however, they were not allowed to travel to school or given sufficient nourishment once they arrived, and were instead forced to work lengthy hours at the munitions plant. They then answered home after the war without having been paid any wages.

The women also claim the fact they were brought to Japan to perform forced labor at war plants was illegal, as was Mitsubishi's failure to compensate them after the war.

Japan enacted a law in 1944 obliging unmarried women aged between 12 and 40 forward the Korean Peninsula, then a Japanese colony to work at munitions plants in Japan during World War II to compensate for a domestic labor shortage. The law also stipulated punishments for those who refused.

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