Subject: [cwj 108] Japan rejects lawsuit by wartime sex slaves
From: Corporate Watch in Japanese <cwj@corpwatch.org>
Date: Tue, 19 Sep 2000 13:09:34 -0700
Seq: 108

2 articles on the latest lawsuit by comfort women against the Japanese
governement.  For more information on how to support the movement for
justice for comfort women, contact the Asia Japan Women's Resource Center
at E-mail: ajwrc@jca.apc.org 

Japan rejects lawsuit by wartime sex slaves

TOKYO, Sept 19 (AFP) - 

Japan on Tuesday dismissed a lawsuit filed in the United States by 15 World
War II "comfort women" who survived Japanese sex slave camps.

"We are aware of the lawsuit," said a foreign ministry official.

"But the Japanese government stance is that all issues related to
compensation were already settled by post-war treaties," he said, declining
to be named. 

The women from South Korea, China, the Philippines and Taiwan filed the
case Monday with the Washington DC District Court, seeking compensation and
an official apology from the Japanese government.

They are among some 200,000 women who were forced into sex slavery by the
Japanese Imperial armed forces between 1932 and 1945, according to the
Washington Coalition for Comfort Women Issues. 

It was the first time that former sex slaves, commonly known as "comfort
women," have sought justice in US courts, and the first time Japan has been
named as a defendant, according to the WCCWI.

But Japan had already settled war compensation in post-war treaties
including the 1951 San Francisco peace settlement with the Allies, the
foreign ministry official argued. 

It also reached bilateral agreements with Asian countries including China
in which they renounced demands for reparations.

"It is up to the plaintiffs to file suit, but as I said compensation issues
were already settled," the official said.

"And I am not so sure whether the petition will even arrive at the foreign
ministry for us to see it," he added, saying it would have to first pass
through lengthy bureaucratic channels including the US State Department.

Japan's government denies that it has abandoned its responsibilities
towards the comfort women. 

In 1995 it set up the Asian Women's Fund, which has so far paid out two
million yen (18,000 dollars) in "atonement money" to each of 170 former sex
slaves and delivered a letter of apology from the prime minister. 

Elderly South Korean and Taiwanese comfort women have received an
additional three million yen each for medical and welfare purposes, while
Filipinos received 1.2 million yen.

Six of the plaintiffs are from South Korea, four from China, four from the
Philippines and one is from Taiwan.

Seoul resident Hwang Geum-Joo, 78, said she was circulated among various
"comfort stations" in China for five years from 1941, when she was 19 years
old, and raped by 30 to 40 Japanese soldiers a day.

"Many of the women became so sick that they had yellow pus from their pubic
hair to their belly buttons, and their faces turned yellow as well," the
suit said.

"Women who got sick three times were taken away by the soldiers and never
returned." 

Four Chinese Americans and five Chinese nationals last month sued Japanese
conglomerates Mitsubishi and Mitsui in Los Angeles, claiming the companies
enslaved thousands of Chinese citizens during World War II. 

Former Allied prisoners of war are also fighting for compensation after
being tortured, starved and worked nearly to death by the Japanese army.

But no Japanese court has supported their reparation claims, citing the
1951 peace settlement.
_____________________________________________

"Comfort women" file suit against Japanese government in Washington

WASHINGTON, Sept 18 (AFP) - 

Fifteen women who survived Japanese sex slave camps during World War II
filed suit against Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs Yohei Kono in US
District Court here on Monday.

The class action suit seeking unspecified damages marks the first time
"comfort women" have sought justice in US courts, and the first time Japan
has been named as a defendant, according to the Washington Coalition for
Comfort Women Issues (WCCWI).

"Like their German racist colleagues in the West, the Japanese pursued
racist policies, and policies which treated women in the most demeaning
manner," attorney Michael Hausfeld told a press conference here.

"We're not looking at these offenses because they are just single instances
of rape. We're looking at them because they involve massive, systematic,
premeditated forced rape," said Hausfeld, whose legal team won a 5.2
billion dollar settlement from the German
government and industries for former slave laborers in Nazi Germany.

Six of the plaintiffs are from South Korea, four are from China, four are
from the Philippines and one is from Taiwan. 

In 1941 Seoul resident Hwang Geum-Joo, 19, was drafted to work in what she
was told was a Japanese military factory.

For five years, she instead was circulated among various "comfort stations"
in China, where she was raped by 30 to 40 Japanese soldiers a day,
according to Hwang's testimony, paraphrased in the suit.

"Many of the women became so sick that they had yellow pus from their pubic
hair to their belly buttons, and their faces turned yellow as well. Women
who got sick three times were taken away by the soldiers and never
returned," the suit said.

Of 20 women brought to the camps with Hwang, she was the only one who
survived.

Dressed in a traditional Korean gown and speaking through a translator, the
diminutive, gray-haired Hwang, now 78, said Monday: "I want (a) formal
apology."

"I have never (been) given a formal apology from the Japanese emperor. I
think the Japanese emperor is finally responsible for what happened and I
want apology from Japan."

Kazuo Kodama, a spokesman for the Japanese embassy in Washington, insisted
that "the Japanese government has expressed on many occasions its sincere
apologies and remorse to the former wartime comfort women."

Kodama said the issue had been legally settled through the 1951 San
Francisco peace treaty -- which formally ended the war with Japan -- and
through bilateral agreements with Asian countries in which they renounced
demands for war reparations.

"But we are not saying that because the issue has been settled legally, we
are not doing anything. That is not correct," Kodama said.

He said the Asian Women's Fund founded by the Japanese government in 1995
was seeking out former comfort women to provide them with two million yen
each in "atonement money" and a letter of apology from the prime minister
of Japan.

Disbursements have been made to 170 women thus far, according to documents
released by the Japanese embassy, clarifying figures cited earlier by an
embassy spokesman.

According to the WCCWI, some 200,000 women were forced into sex slavery by
the Japanese Imperial Military between 1932 and 1945.

The class action suit was filed here Monday under the Alien Tort Claims
Act, an 18th century US law that grants foreign citizens the right to sue
for abuses of customary international law in US courts.

Hausfeld said it could take two to three years to prosecute the case and
that attorneys would work extensively with plaintiffs and with historians
before "addressing the issue of how Japan should respond in terms of
compensation."

On Friday WCCWI activist Christopher Simpson told AFP: "Given the gravity
of the crime, given the extensive character of this network of rape camps,
the claim will most certainly be measured in the tens of billions of dollars."

FAIR USE NOTICE. This document contains copyrighted material whose use has
not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner.  Corporate Watch
in Japanese is making this article available in our efforts to advance
understanding of ecological sustainability, human rights, economic
democracy and social justice issues. We believe that this constitutes a
'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of
the US Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for
purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission
from the copyright owner.
-------------------------------------
Corporate Watch in Japanese
Transnational Resource and Action Center (TRAC)
P.O. Box 29344
San Francisco, CA 94129 USA
Tel: 1-415-561-6472
Fax: 1-415-561-6493
Email: cwj@corpwatch.org
URL:  http://www.corpwatch-jp.org
-------------------------------------
______________________
The Corporate Watch in Japanese http://www.corpwatch.org/japan (CWJ)
mailing list is a moderated email list in English designed to connect
activists campaigning against Japanese corporations and investments around
the world.
*
To unsubscribe from the CWJ mailing list, send an email to
majordomo@jca.apc.org with text "unsubscribe cwj".  To subscribe to the CWJ
mailing list, send a message to majordomo@jca.apc.org with the text
"subscribe cwj"
*
The CWJ mailing list is NOT intended for wide distribution.  If you would
like to post messages from this list somewhere else, we ask that you first
contact us at cwj@corpwatch.org
______________________