Japan won't apologize again for WW2 sex slaves -PM

By Linda Sieg

TOKYO (Reuters) - Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Monday that Japan would not apologize again for forcing women, mostly Asian, to act as wartime sex slaves for its soldiers even if U.S. lawmakers adopt a resolution calling for an apology.

Abe, seeking to bolster support among his conservative base, has already sparked diplomatic ire by appearing to question the state's role in forcing the women to act as sex slaves for soldiers during World War Two.

U.S. Congressman Michael Honda, a California Democrat, has introduced a non-binding resolution calling on Japan to unambiguously apologize for the tragedy that thousands of Asian women, many Korean, endured at the hands of its Imperial Army.

"I have to say that even if the resolution passes, that doesn't mean we will apologize," Abe told a parliamentary panel on Monday, adding the U.S. resolution contained factual errors.

But Abe repeated that he stood by a 1993 government apology that acknowledged the Japanese military's a role in setting up and managing wartime brothels and that coercion was used.

Abe, who wants to rewrite Japan's pacifist constitution and restore a sense of pride in the nation's past, upset his core conservative supporters and startled critics when he softened his stance on wartime history after taking office last September.

Among those shifts was his decision to stand by the 1993 apology, known at the "Kono Statement," after then-Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono, in whose name it was issued.

The softer stance on history was widely seen as an attempt to smooth the way for summits with China and South Korea and improve ties that had chilled under his predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi.