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TOKYO (AP) — The study that led Japan to apologize in 1993 for forcing Asian women into wartime prostitution was confirmed as valid by a parliament-appointed panel Friday after South Korea and China slammed the review as an attempt to discredit historical evidence of such abuses.

Officials said Japan stood by its earlier pledge not to change the landmark apology.

"We concluded that the content of the study was valid," said lawyer Keiichi Tadaki, who headed the five-member panel that reviewed about 250 sets of documents used for the government study that was the basis of the 1993 apology.

The new investigation focused on how the study, which included interviews with 16 former Korean victims, was conducted, not its historical findings. But any discussion of bitter World War II history is sensitive, especially when Japan's relations with its two closest neighbors are soured by territorial disputes.

The panel started its study in April after a top bureaucrat who helped in the 1993 study questioned the authenticity of the interviews, while suggesting Seoul possibly pressured Tokyo into acknowledging the women were coerced.

Tadaki, who briefed the contents of the report, said Japan had enough evidence from other documents to produce the apology and that the hearings of the women were supplementary and intended to show Japan's compassion rather than to verify historical evidence. His team's report acknowledged Tokyo and Seoul negotiated at length over the wording but that did not distort historical facts mentioned in the apology.

Historians say 80,000 to 200,000 women from across Asia, many of them Koreans, were forced to provide sex to Japan's front-line soldiers. Japanese nationalists contend that women in wartime brothels were voluntary prostitutes, not sex slaves, and that Japan has been unfairly criticized for a practice they say is common in any country at war.

Abe himself has been criticized by South Korea and China for backpedaling from past Japanese apologies and acknowledgements of wartime atrocities.

Japanese officials interviewed 16 of such women in 1993 at South Korea's request as part of an investigation that led to the apology by then-Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono, and known as "the Kono statement," which acknowledged many women were forced into prostitution for Japan's wartime military.

Government spokesman Yoshihide Suga reiterated Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's pledge not to revise the 1993 apology, saying that evaluation of the historical evidence should be left up to historians and scholars.

"Japan's relations with South Korea are extremely important and we will try to explain this issue to gain understanding," Suga said.

A reversal of the apology would have worsened strained relations in the region.

Adding to the ire, the South Korean navy on Friday conducted live-fire exercises in seas near islands that are claimed by both countries. Top Japanese officials protested the drills, but South Korean officials said the exercises were routine and rejected Tokyo's demands to cancel them.

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Associated Press writers Jung-yoon Choi in Seoul and Elaine Kurtenbach in Tokyo contributed to this report.

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — A report by federal transportation safety investigators says a truck driver was speeding before he slammed into a limousine van, killing one man and seriously injuring comedian Tracy Morgan and two other passengers, and it has raised new questions about the trucker's work schedule.

Wal-Mart driver Kevin Roper was going 65 mph in a 45 mph zone just before the June 7 crash on the New Jersey Turnpike, according to the National Transportation Safety Board's report. The crash killed 62-year-old James McNair of Peekskill, New York.

The report also detailed Roper's schedule on the day leading up to the crash, from when he left a Wal-Mart facility in Smyrna, Delaware, at about 11:30 a.m. before making stops in Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Just after midnight on June 7 he left Bristol, Pennsylvania, en route to Perth Amboy, New Jersey, when the crash happened about 30 minutes into his trip.

Roper had been on the job about 13 1/2 hours at the time of the crash, the report concluded. Federal rules permit truck drivers to work up to 14 hours a day, with a maximum of 11 hours behind the wheel.

Had Roper continued to his eventual destination in Perth Amboy, he would have been pushing the 14-hour limit if he drove at the speed limit. A Wal-Mart spokeswoman didn't comment Thursday on Roper's hours or his itinerary. .

In response to the findings, the Teamsters Union urged Congress not to ease laws that limit truck drivers to 60 to 70 hours of work each week. The Senate is considering a resolution that would extend the maximum to 80 hours per week.

"The NTSB's preliminary findings in this case clearly show that truck drivers are pushing beyond the limits of the current hours of service rules," Teamsters General President James P. Hoffa said.

The safety board report said investigators were still probing Roper's activities in the days leading up to the crash to determine the amount of rest he received. A criminal complaint in New Jersey that charges the 35-year-old Jonesboro, Georgia, resident with death by auto and assault by auto contends he hadn't slept in more than 24 hours before the crash. Roper has pleaded not guilty.

Messages left Thursday at several phone numbers listed for Roper's attorney were not immediately returned.

An NTSB spokesman also said Thursday the agency was probing what kind of crash avoidance technology was aboard the vehicles involved in the accident. Roper's truck was equipped with a system designed to slow its speed and notify him of stopped traffic ahead, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman said in the days immediately after the crash, but it's unknown if the system was working.

Traffic was slowed on the night of the accident by construction that blocked two of the highway's three northbound lanes. According to the NTSB report, a sign warned of the lane closures about a mile south of where the accident occurred, and another sign a half-mile closer directed motorists to reduce their speed from 55 mph to 45 mph.

The truck struck Morgan's limo from behind, sending it into other vehicles and eventually onto its side. Morgan is hospitalized in fair condition with a broken leg and other injuries.

Morgan's assistant, Jeffrey Millea, of Shelton, Connecticut, has also been upgraded to fair condition, according to Morgan's spokesman. Hospital officials said Monday that comedian Ardie Fuqua, of Jersey City, remains in critical condition.

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Associated Press writer Maryclaire Dale in Philadelphia contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON (AP) — House Democrats' campaign arm said Friday it raised $7.3 million in May despite long odds of toppling Republicans from their majority.

A summary of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's finances also shows them with $45.9 million in the bank. House Democrats have consistently outraised their GOP rivals this election cycle and have built a formidable savings account that they are ready to empty on ads this fall.

House Republicans also faced a Friday deadline to disclose their May fundraising. They have not yet released their figures. At the end of April, the National Republican Congressional Committee was sitting atop $32.3 million.

House Republicans have 233 seats and Democrats have 199 seats. There are three vacancies.

Redrawn congressional districts after the 2010 census heavily favor Republicans, and big spending still might not be enough to tip the balance of power. Coupled with that, the party that holds the White House historically has lost seats in elections at this point in a president's term, and President Barack Obama, a Democrat, is very unpopular in many congressional districts.

Even so, House Democrats have outraised their Republican rivals in 14 of the last 16 months. If the trend holds steady for May, that streak could be extended to 15 of the last 17 months.

"Our supporters believe that it is more important than ever to have leaders in Washington who will end the damaging dysfunction and focus on strengthening the economy for middle class families," Rep. Steve Israel, head of the Democrats campaign committee, said in a statement accompanying the fundraising reports.

That level of enthusiasm among Democratic donors has allowed the DCCC to book $44 million in advertising time for November's elections. House Republicans have reserved $30 million in air time.

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Follow Philip Elliott on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/philip_elliott

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The weeklong odyssey of a registered sex offender traveling with a missing teenage girl from Florida ended after a sighting by a Louisiana truck stop cashier triggered a lengthy police chase, authorities say.

Officers pursued a pickup truck driven by 41-year-old Steven Myers for miles, throwing down spike strips that blew out most of the pickup's tires, law enforcement agents said, adding Myers allegedly stabbed the 16-year-old girl and then himself before being subdued.

The 28-year-old cashier at the Tiger Truck Stop in Grosse Tete, Louisiana, said security footage later showed the two were in the store 75 seconds. But she said she recognized the two from video she had chanced upon while scrolling through Facebook before being called to work an unscheduled shift Wednesday night.

"My stomach dropped," said cashier Fawn Lasseigne Domingue.

The girl's family and neighbors had begun social media campaigns since the girl had gone missing June 11 in the Tampa, Florida, area — about a 10-hour drive from Grosse Tete.

Wanting to be certain, Domingue went to the office and pulled up the video segment on her phone. When she returned, Myers and the girl were already outside the store. Manager Scott Holbrook said Domingue told him, "Call the police. It's a kidnapped girl," and followed them into the parking lot.

Domingue said Myers was about to pull out of the lot in a pickup truck when the first deputy arrived and she pointed out the truck, which authorities later said was stolen in the Florida Panhandle. Two more police cars showed up almost immediately, the cashier said.

Authorities said the chase lasted for miles through truck and car traffic.

Cpl. Paul Mouton of the Lafayette Police Department said the man got out of the truck with a knife at the end, and officers subdued him with a stun gun and a police dog. Officers then got the girl out of the truck. Myers allegedly stabbed the girl, then himself, and was bitten by the police dog that helped subdue him, authorities said.

The Plant City, Florida, man and the 16-year-old girl, from Valrico, Florida, were hospitalized Thursday in serious but stable condition with knife wounds, according to police.

Myers, who registered in Plant City as a sex offender, will face charges including attempted murder and unlawful sexual activity, officials in the two states said. He has served two Georgia prison sentences, the first for a 1999 conviction on child molestation charges and the second for a parole violation. He was released in February 2012.

"To hear that your daughter, your baby, has been stabbed ... I wouldn't wish that on anyone," the girl's father said Thursday at a news conference in Tampa. But he said, "I know my daughter's strong. I know she'll pull through this."

The Associated Press is not identifying the girl or her family because of allegations that she was sexually assaulted.

The teen, who had missing since June 11, is bipolar and had left her medications behind, officials said. The girl wasn't kidnapped, but Myers had manipulated her to go with him, Hillsborough sheriff's Col. Donna Lusczynski said in the Tampa area.

Lusczynski and Sheriff Brett Stassi of Iberville Parish both said Myers stabbed himself after getting out of the truck, and told police to shoot him. Mouton would not confirm or deny that scenario.

Myers fled, repeatedly swerving at cars and tractor-trailers he was passing in an effort to cause crashes that would stop or slow the police cars behind him, Stassi also said.

"He never stopped. The truck gave out on him," said Stassi, who said his deputies chased Myers from start to finish.

Mouton said spike strips thrown down by state police blew out five of the six tires on the truck, a work pickup with a welding rig on the back.

"He was running with no rubber at all," Stassi said.

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Associated Press writers Kate Brumback in Atlanta; Jared Leone in Valrico, Florida; and Bill Fuller in New Orleans contributed to this report.