The agreement includes a statement of responsibility by the Japanese government for the comfort women's suffering, as well as an apology from Prime Minister Abe and a one billion Yen fund.
NGO groups in South Korea will not be content, but the agreement goes farther than most thought Japan would go in terms of admitting government responsibility.
The burden will fall on South Korea to fulfill its commitment that this is the final settlement of the issue, meaning a complex domestic landscape as the government must manage the NGO and political opposition reaction.
At the political level, this should pave the way, hopefully, for a normalization of political relations for the remainder of the Park and Abe terms including enhanced trilateral cooperation with the United States on regional security issues including military information sharing agreements among the allies.