These questions are being raised since Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Monday apologized to the government of South Korea for the Japanese military’s use of South Korean “comfort women” during Japan’s occupation from 1932 to 1945. As further restitution, Japan will pay $8.3 million to a foundation to be established by South Korea for services to surviving victims. There are reported to be between 46 and 53 in that country.
“Comfort women” is a term used for the as many as 200,000 Asian and Dutch women and girls who befell various terrors during World War II. Some as young as 12 in China, Indonesia (then a Dutch colony), the Philippines and North and South Korea were sent to brothels to provide sexual services to Japanese soldiers and held for months or even years.
The practice only became public in 1991, when a Korean survivor disclosed her experience. At first the Japanese government denied it. Then, in 1993, it apologized and paid some donated money to South Korea.
That apology didn’t satisfy survivors, who have staged weekly protests for 22 years in front of the Japanese embassy in South Korea’s capital, Seoul.
Some Japanese nationals continue to deny “comfort women” were forced or coerced, saying they were prostitutes. It took pressure from the United States to bring about this week’s announcement. President Barack Obama urged Japan and South Korea — its closest allies in the region — to resolve the dispute so the countries can put up a united front against China and North Korea.
Some critics still don’t consider this week’s apology enough. Mira Yusef, who runs Monsoon: United Asian Women of Iowa, a sexual assault and domestic violence prevention organization, said government leaders “are making those decisions. Survivors didn’t even have a say in it.” Yusef says it’s not even clear South Korea’s survivors will get the money.
In a project called Comfort Women Wanted, Korean-born artist Chang-Jin Lee interviewed survivors and witnesses on camera.
In the interviews, a former Japanese soldier said women were required to have sex with 50 to 100 soldiers a day. A Korean woman spoke of being kidnapped at 15 and taken to a brothel. A Dutch woman in Indonesia recalled being lined up with other girls 18 and older and taken to a brothel. A Filipina woman said she was kidnapped by Japanese soldiers at 14 and forced into sexual slavery.
There are 70 former “comfort women” in the Philippines, but to date, they’ve received no compensation or apology, according to Yusef. Neither have survivors in other countries.
Monday’s agreement calls for South Korea and Japan to no longer criticize each other over the issue. Yusef wants Japan’s treatment of “comfort women” to be remembered and taught as a stain on Japan’s history — not whitewashed or buried.
Nothing can make up for the humiliation, brutality and fear the women suffered. But since perpetrators will never be brought to justice, Japan could show its sincerity by erecting monuments to those wronged, by refuting the deniers, and by repeating George Santayana’s famous line: Those who cannot learn from the past are condemned to repeat it.
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