TOKYO: Japan says it has found no evidence its World War II government and military forcibly rounded up women to be sex slaves, Tokyo has told a United Nations committee, the latest pronouncement in a corrosive row over interpretations of history.

The confirmation on Tuesday, ahead of a conference on women later this month, is likely to renew anger among the dwindling number of surviving former “comfort women,” who say the country has never taken full responsibility for what it did in wartime.