Unusual Monument
Recently extraordinary monuments
have been built in several cities in the United States and other
parts of the world–they are the monuments to the comfort women for
the Japanese army during days of the Second World War.
A city in New Jersey erected the
first monument of this kind in October 2010. It was followed by New
York.
The monument erected in New York
is inscribed with the words that the former Japanese army forcibly
kidnapped over 200 000 women to satisfy the sexual desire of its
soldiers and that the anti-human sex crimes committed by it will
never be forgotten.
As is widely known in the world
the Japanese imperialists reduced over 200 000 women from Korea and
various other countries into sexual slaves for their soldiers in the
days of the Pacific War by forcibly dragging, kidnapping and
abducting them.
The world history of war records
no country like Japan which committed an organized and collective
rape on foreign women taking them to the battle fields. Wherever the
Japanese army set their feet on, may it be China, Thailand, Myanmar,
Singapore, Sakhalin or Guam, is permeated with the rancour of their
sexual slaves; their souls do not rest in peace there.
The International Women’s
Tribunal for War Crimes held in Tokyo, Japan in December 2000 and
many international conferences and organizations such as the UN
Commission on Human Rights and the UN Committee on the Elimination of
the Discrimination against Women stigmatized the sex crimes of Japan
as largest-scale anti-human and state-sponsored crimes and delivered
judgments that Japan must thoroughly apologize and compensate for
them.
However, until today when nearly
70 years have passed since its defeat, Japan has been doggedly
sidestepping self-criticism and apology for the crimes it committed
in the past.
The shameless attitude of Japan
aroused the indignation in the conscience of the world. By reflecting
this indignation monuments disclosing the heinous crimes of Japan
have been erected one after another even in the United States, one of
its allies. What further infuriates the international community is
that some Japanese politicians are denying and distorting the stark
realities of history with a view to shirking the liquidation of the
past.
Worse still, tripping off their
tongue are such absurd arguments as that there is no evidence that
Korean women had been dragged by violence and under threat and that
it was a voluntary act of prostitutes to earn money and that wartime
rape is not a war crime or anti-human crime.
This is the true colours of Japan
which is enthusiastically advocating civilization, humanitarianism
and building of a beautiful country in the international arena.
It is an elementary article of
moral obligation of human beings for the assailant to apologize for
his crime and indemnify the victim. The same holds true of countries.
However, though the government is
frequently reshuffled in Japan, no authorities had ever made a
sincere apology for its past crimes. On the contrary, they are making
desperate efforts to cover its shameful past which is known all to
the world.
Not long ago Japanese diplomats
proposed Japan’s investment in the development of the city in New
Jersey in return for the demolition of the monument to the comfort
women erected in front of a municipal library, only to be flatly
rejected. This can be said to be an extension of the cunning method
Japan used in the closing years of the last century to conceal the
anti-human enormity behind the curtain of history by giving a small
amount of national fund squeezed from its people to some surviving
comfort women. At a meeting of the United Nations Human Rights
Council the Japanese representative revealed once again the
craftiness and shamelessness peculiar to Japan by saying that the
problem of comfort women had already been settled.
The international community
severely criticizes Japan.
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
of Germany, L’Express of France, The Financial Times
of Britain and El Mundo of Spain and the international
conferences such as the UN Human Rights Council and the International
Solidarity Council showered criticism on mean acts of Japan.
Even the United States denounces
it. A Democratic member of the US Congress who was former chairman of
the diplomatic commission of the House of Representatives said that
some Japanese tried to shift their responsibility onto the victims
denying and distorting history, a disgusting act. The Secretary of
State Hillery Clinton asserted that “sexual slaves” are more
appropriate than “comfort women for the Japanese army.”
Japan should be well aware of how
it is regarded by the international community.
It must clearly know that without
compensating for its past crimes it cannot lift its face in the
international community nor escape from international isolation and
denunciation.
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