Gannett

"The Comfort Women: Japan's Brutal Regime of Enforced Prostitution in the Second World War," by George Hicks. Illustrated. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. 303 pages. $25 Once again, the Japanese government has sought to right a wrong of its wartime past - apologizing to the Asian women who were rounded up and forced into satisfying the sexual needs of the Japanese Armed Forces. Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama's July 18 acknowledgement of Japan's complicity in the sexual enslavement of the so-called "comfort women" is not the first apology offered to the victims, the majority of whom were Korean.

The head of Tribune Co.'s publishing division said yesterday that The Sun and the company's other newspapers are not for sale, beyond the two small Connecticut papers it agreed to shed this week. Tribune announced Tuesday that it is selling The Advocate of Stamford and the Greenwich Time to Gannett Co. for $73 million as part of the company's plans to improve its finances. The Chicago media company is expected to decide by the end this month whether to sell or restructure the company.

Publishing tycoon Allen Neuharth's $700 million ''Freedom Forum,'' the foundation that proclaims its mission is to defend the First Amendment, has been getting some sharp stings from the free press it's pledged to protect.A spate of critical articles surfaced almost as soon as the Chronicle of Philanthropy reported in late March that the New York state attorney general was looking into allegedly ''excessive and imprudent'' Freedom Forum spending.And the details were, in fact, rather compelling.

When Thiru Vignarajah left the Maryland U.S. attorney's office to lead a new unit of the city prosecutors, there was the matter of putting together a new team of lawyers to pursue major crimes, bolstering relationships with police and other law enforcement agencies, and identifying the city's most violent criminals. There was also another matter: painting the office. To help create a sense of ownership over their work, he encouraged his new prosecutors to pick out their offices and paint the walls with the color of their choice.

The Baltimore County school system will have to spend as much as $7 million more than expected for an addition at one of its high schools, after allowing a construction firm to pull out of the project over a dispute with the architect, leaving only a concrete foundation and 2-foot-high walls behind. Contractor James W. Ancel asked to leave the $20 million project at Milford Mill Academy last year, claiming the architectural drawings supplied by the county were flawed. The school system decided to pay him $7.6 million for the work he performed and for equipment and materials he brought to the site, and then to seek another contractor, calling it the most expedient and sensible resolution.

Monday Earnings reports Commerce Banc, Fannie Mae, Fleet Boston, Gannett, New York Times, Unisys, J.B. Hunt, Tractor Supply Tuesday * March retail sales Earnings reports AmSouth Banc, CDW Corp., Delta Air Lines, Dow Jones, E*Trade, IBM, Johnson & Johnson, Manpower, State Street, Wells Fargo, Motorola, Washington Mutual Wednesday * Consumer Price Index for March * February balance-of-trade report Earnings reports Bank of America, Baxter, Coca-Cola, J.P. Morgan Chase, Merrill Lynch, Tellabs, Apple Computer, Molex, Texas Instruments Thursday * Initial unemployment claims Earnings reports Ceridian, Citigroup, Continental Air, Equitable Res, Fairchild Semi, Fifth Third, Fortune Brands, Honeywell, Johnson Controls, PepsiCo, Southwest Air, Tribune, UnitedHealth Group, Sun Microsystems Friday * Housing starts and building permits for March * Industrial production for March Earnings reports Delphi Auto, Diamond Offshore, Wilmington Trust, W.W. Grainger, Compass Banc

A federal judge said yesterday a former Navy SEAL accused of keeping a stash of military explosives in his Kent Island home should remain jailed until authorities agree on appropriate psychiatric treatment. Eugenio Giolitti, 39, of Stevensville was indicted Sept. 7 on four counts of possessing unregistered firearms, including three silencers, and on seven counts of improperly storing explosives. He was arrested Aug. 27 after a dispute with a neighbor led police to search his waterfront home.