EDITORIAL / Asian Woman's Fund based on distortions 2005.02.06 THE DAILY YOMIURI/February 06, 2005, Sunday/No. 4
What was the purpose of establishing the Asian Women's Fund?
The government-authorized corporation has been in operation for about 10 years, mainly with the aim of providing allowances for purported former comfort women in other Asian countries. The corporation, which has nearly completed its mission, will be disbanded in two years.
The corporation was established in 1995. It has since collected about 600 million yen in donations from Japanese, and has given 285 purported former comfort women in South Korea, Taiwan and the Philippines 2 million yen each.
It should be noted, however, that a major driving force behind the establishment of the fund was an attempt by some quarters of society to misrepresent historical facts on the purported former comfort women.
For example, some newspapers campaigned to convince the public that the system created to form corps of women volunteers eager to contribute to the war effort during World War II was an attempt by the Imperial Japanese Army to forcibly recruit women as comfort women. This did much to ensure the mistaken perception both at home and abroad that the women who worked at brothels had been forced to do so by the Imperial Army after being forcibly transported to such facilities for sexual servitude. The campaign aroused a sensational reaction, especially among South Koreans.
Kono's statement ridiculous =========================== The Japanese government was thoughtless in dealing with the rising tide of antagonism overseas as a result of the campaign. An excellent example of this was seen in a statement issued by Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono under the Cabinet of Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa in August 1993. Kono's statement said "the government authorities had played a part" in what critics called "forcible transportation" of women for service at brothels.
However, the statement was unsupported by historical facts. Kono's comment has been discredited by testimony from several senior officials in the Miyazawa government, including then Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobuo Ishihara. A high-ranking bureaucrat who was director general of the Cabinet Councillors' Office on External Affairs during the days of the Miyazawa Cabinet also said the same thing before the Diet.
No forcible transportations =========================== All this shows there were no grounds for the assertion that the comfort women were victims forcibly transported to wartime brothels.
But Kono's patently false statement took on a life of its own, somehow transmogrifying to become the official view of the Japanese government about the issue of purported comfort women.
In South Korea, the statement was taken
as the Japanese government's acknowledgment of its purported "forcible transportation" of women to brothels. In Japan, too, a campaign to "compensate forcible transportation" gathered momentum. All these developments led to the establishment of the Asian Women's Fund.
The attempt by some quarters of society to distort the historical facts on purported comfort women was also one cause of the ongoing dispute between NHK and The Asahi Shimbun over which lied about an altered television program.
Kono's statement was a boon for a campaign to conduct a "women's international tribunal of war criminals" in December 2000, a mock trial the NHK program in question featured.
What criteria were adopted by the Asian Women's Fund to produce a list of women "eligible" to receive allowances? The fund was established with little effort to inspect historical facts about purported comfort women. Given this, it is no wonder that some always have viewed the fund with skepticism. (From The Yomiuri Shimbun, Feb. 6)
Compensation for ROK comfort women to stop 2002.02.22 THE DAILY YOMIURI/February 22, 2002, Friday/No. 2
The Asian Women's Fund, a Tokyo-based nonprofit organization supporting so-called comfort women on the basis of contributions from the public, said Wednesday that from May 1 it will no longer provide compensation to South Korean comfort women.
The five-year term for the project will expire at the end of April, but it has been, in effect, suspended since July 1999 because the South Korean government complained that responsibility for the sexual enslavement of the women during World War II rested not with the Japanese people, but with the Japanese government. Seoul maintained it was illogical for the Japanese public to compensate the women.
A report submitted last week to a U.N. human rights subcommittee on the "comfort women" issue was disappointing for several reasons, not least because of inadequate fact-checking and a distorted interpretation of history.
The report, compiled by Gay McDougall of the United States, rapporteur of the subcommittee, requests that the Japanese government offer state compensation to the comfort women and prosecute those who established the system that forced them to provide sexual services to the Japanese military before and during World War II.
Evidence of the haphazard way in which the report was compiled can be seen in its liberal use of terms such as "rape camps" and "rape centers," as well as the way in which it compares the issue to slavery and the slave trade.
Radhika Coomaraswamy, another U.N. special reporter, had submitted two reports on the matter to the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights prior to last week's report.
The first report, submitted in 1996, was considered by many observers to be dubious because it contained several direct quotations from a Japanese author whose work has sometimes been criticized as phony. The tone of the second report, submitted this past spring, was relatively fairer and the talk about offering state compensation and seeking punishment had been ditched.
Singling out Japan ================== The primary responsibility of the U.N. subcommittee is to deal with human rights violations in countries such as Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, both of which are currently experiencing widespread human rights abuse. So why should Japan's comfort women issue--now more than five decades after the fact--suddenly be singled out as a matter that warrants the attention of the human rights subcommittee?
German soldiers regularly forced women in occupied areas to provide them with sexual services during the war. Japan should not be singled out for several reasons, not least because it has not yet even been confirmed that the wartime government forced the comfort women to provide sexual services.
Soviet forces took hundreds of thousands of Japanese to Siberia shortly after the war ended-- in clear violation of international law--and forced them to work as slave laborers. Thousands of them died there under horrible conditions. Why didn't the report take up this issue?
During the occupation after the war, many "Recreation and Amusement Association" facilities were set up in Japan. These were actually prostitution facilities for officers of the Allied forces. Such places were established under sponsorship of the Japanese government in an effort to deter Allied troops from committing sexual violence against the citizenry at large, but some facilities were established by order of the U.S. military.
If McDougall asks the Japanese government to provide state compensation for the comfort women and requests that those who set up the system be punished, why doesn't she make the same request to the government of the United States, of which she is a citizen?
Interpreting history ==================== The history of any nation, or any ethnic race for that matter, cannot be correctly told if various "dark sides" are left out of the story. Requests such as that by McDougall are unreasonable in that they ignore different interpretations of history and name a specific nation as "the source of all evil." This only damages the credibility of the United Nations, which claims "universality" to be one of its guiding principles.
There is, however, one factor in Japan that may have contributed to make the Coomaraswamy and McDougall reports so biased. Some media organizations and citizens groups have praised the stories that are published by various charlatans on Japan's wartime conduct. For instance, according to some of their stories, "female labor volunteers," who worked in a semivoluntary capacity, also were sometimes forced to provide sexual services. Such people have been making a habit out of providing such incorrect information on the matter to the international community.
Yohei Kono, who was chief cabinet secretary in 1993, has said that Asian females were "forcibly taken" to work as comfort women. He said this, we believe, because he has shallow diplomatic insight. Such statements only serve to throw this already complicated issue into more chaos. Such statements, as well as incorrect information transmitted by irresponsible people and groups, must be corrected immediately.
It is essential that we reflect upon the past. However, this should be done on the premise that cool and reasonable arguments are a part of such reflections. (From Aug. 11 Yomiuri Shimbun)
Editorial / Emperor's visit to South Korea 1998.12.05 THE DAILY YOMIURI/December 05, 1998, Saturday/No. 6
The government of South Korea has invited the Emperor to visit that country in 2000.
The fact that the Emperor has not visited South Korea--Japan's closest neighbor-- shows that ties between the two countries are still very complicated. Both countries must work to establish an environment favorable for such a visit.
The most important factor in establishing a favorable environment is the public opinion in both countries.
But according to a recent Yomiuri Shimbun survey, only 31 percent of the respondents said the Emperor should make an official visit to South Korea before 2002, when the two countries cohost the 2002 World Cup soccer finals.
Forty-eight percent of the respondents said that although the visit should be realized sometime in the future, there was no need for the government to hurry to arrange a visit. Sixteen percent of the respondents opposed even the idea of a visit.
The survey results suggest that at least for now a favorable environment does not exist for the Emperor to make an official visit to South Korea.
Putting the past behind ======================= The governments of both countries emphasized in a joint Japan-South Korea declaration signed during South Korean President Kim Dae Jung's visit to Japan in October that Japan's apology for its colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula was meant to put the bitter past between the two countries to rest.
Yet the same survey shows that 56 percent of the respondents were not convinced that the declaration had achieved this.
Obviously many people think the issue of the past has not been settled despite statements in the joint declaration to the contrary.
Such feelings may also reflect a cautious attitude among Japanese people who fear that saying so easily that the issue of the past is settled may offend the South Koreans.
One issue that shows how sensitive bilateral ties are is how South Koreans refer to the Emperor, who, according to the Constitution, is "the symbol of the State and of the unity of the people."
Prior to Kim's official visit in October, the South Korean government modified its way of referring to the Emperor and began using the same honorific used by Japanese. But most mass media in South Korea continue using a less respectful way of referring to the Emperor.
As things stand now, a majority of Japanese do not favor a visit to South Korea by the Emperor.
Mass media to blame =================== Mass media in Japan are partly to blame for this state of affairs. Some in the media have a tendency to give excessive coverage to improper remarks made by politicians.
In one case, a story was fabricated about a women volunteer corps organized by the wartime Japanese government to work at factories and other sites. The report said the women, some of whom came from Korea, served as so-called comfort women for the Japanese military, thus stirring up anti-Japan sentiments in South Korea.
In reaction to the negative response in South Korea to such stories, many Japanese in turn developed ill feelings toward South Koreans.
When considering these developments, it is important for politicians, particularly Cabinet members, to refrain from making careless remarks.
Looking at the future relations between the two countries from a broad perspective, it is indeed desirable for the Emperor's visit to South Korea, as a matter of principle, to be seen by the people of both countries as a natural development.
But we should avoid fixing the schedule of such a visit first.
We would like to give high marks to the stance of the South Korean government of "welcoming the Emperor for a warm and pleasant visit." If, by any chance, some mishap or unpleasantness should occur during the Emperor's visit, it may end up making bilateral relations ever more sour.
We will be very interested to see the results of the efforts by the governments and people of both countries. (From Dec. 5 Yomiuri Shimbun)
