World War II Comfort Women - Survivor stories and struggle for restitution.
Latest hand-picked WWII news. See also: Japanese Atrocities in WWII, Women & Horror, Women in World War II .
Documentary film in the works to chronicle comfort women's fight
A painful 20-year fight by Taiwanese women for dignity and for an apology from Japan after being driven into WWII sex slavery is being recorded in a documentary by a Taipei-based rights group. The short film aims to show that the women are no longer victims of the atrocities of the past, the Taipei Women's Rescue Foundation said. The project, which began in late 2010, has been a race against time as the surviving comfort women are all nearly 90 years old and two former comfort women have passed away since the project began.
(focustaiwan.tw)
Comfort women put up statue at their 1,000th rally outside the Japanese embassy in Seoul
South Korean women kept as sex slaves by the Japanese army during World War II have held their 1,000th rally outside the Japanese embassy in Seoul - and put up a statue of a girl in traditional costume there. Japan has reportedly protested about the statue, but South Korean officials have said they cannot do anything about it.
(bbc.co.uk)
Comfort Women: Weekly protest vs. Japan to mark 1,000th rally in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul
"Wednesday Rally," a weekly demonstration held in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul to demand Japan`s official apology and compensation for Korean women used as sex slaves will mark its 1,000th assembly. The demonstration was listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the world`s oldest rally on a single theme in 2002, when its 500th rally was held. The Korea Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sex Slavery by Japan will unveil a monument symbolizing a victim in front of the Japanese Embassy. In addition, 37 cities in nine countries will also hold rallies to show their solidarity and draw world attention to the matter.
(donga.com)
South Korea presses Japan at U.N. over comfort women
After decades of frustration, personal protests and government declarations, South Korea has appealed to the United Nations in its demand that Japan take "legal responsibility" for enslaving 200,000 Korean women as prostitutes during the Second World War. Known as "comfort women," the victims were forced to provide sexual services for Japanese soldiers based on the Korean peninsula.
(latimes.com)
Liu Huang A-tao, the first Taiwanese woman to accuse Japan of forcing her into sexual slavery, has died at 90
Liu Huang A-tao has passed away at the age of 90, still waiting for an official apology and compensation from Japan for the years she was forced to work in a front-line brothel for the Japanese WWII military. Her death brings the number of surviving Taiwanese "comfort women" to 10, according to the Taipei Women's Rescue Foundation. In 1942, Liu Huang applied to join the Japanese nursing corps, but was forced to provide sex to Japanese soldiers after stepping off a transport ship in Indonesia. She sustained injuries during fighting and had to have her womb removed, only returning to Taiwan after Japan's surrender in 1945.
(telegraph.co.uk)
Filipino wartime sex slaves tell their story in documentary film "Katarungan! Justice for Lolas!"
The director of a documentary film on Filipino victims of Japan's wartime sexual slavery says the memories of the aging women now won't be lost to posterity. "Many of them became victims of sexual violence by Japanese soldiers at the ages of 14 or 15, and they are around 80 years old now. I wanted to record the lives of those who have survived decades of hardships," said filmmaker Chieko Takemi. In "Katarungan! Justice for Lolas!" People in Manila as well as Luzon and Leyte islands testified how barbaric Japanese soldiers sexually targeted local women and mistreated the community at large.
(japantimes.co.jp)
Hilde Janssen publishes Comfort Women's intimate oral histories and portraits in a book titled Comfort Women
Dutch journalist and researcher Hilde Janssen teamed up with photographer Jan Banning to do a project about surviving comfort women, who rarely share their WWII experiences. Fortunately, Janssen managed to get them to open up for a book called "Comfort Women." There also is a documentary film about the making of Comfort Women. Niyem was 10-years-old when was kidnapped and loaded into a truck full of other women destined for a military camp in West Java. She shared a small tent with two other girls, where Japanese soldiers openly raped them. When Niyem managed to escape and return home, her parents didn't recognize her and people called her a "Japanese hand-me-down."
(npr.org)
Comfort women exhibition opens in Taiwan
Taiwanese comfort women condemned Japan at the opening of an exhibition - which features documents, petitions, media reports and videos - that explores Taiwan's legal battle against Japan about sex slaves used by the Japanese Imperial Army. "We flew to Japan several times but they would not let we victims testify in court," said Chen Tao, one of the last 13 surviving comfort women in Taiwan, talking about trials that took place 1999-2005, when the Japanese high court ruled against the comfort women in 3 separate appeals.
(focustaiwan.tw)
300,000 signatures - requesting compensation for the comfort women - sent to Japan
300,000 signatures of people calling for an apology and compensation for "comfort women" have been collected and will be sent to the Japanese government. Only 82 comfort women are still alive, and most of them are not in good health.
(koreatimes.co.kr)
900th protest of Korea's Comfort Women - Survivors of Japanese Military Sexual Slavery
Dressed warmly against cold weather comfort women gathered on Dec. 13 2009 for their 900th Wednesday protest outside the Japanese Embassy in Seoul. The women have been protesting every Wednesday since Jan. 8, 1992. Japanese military sexual slavery started in 1932 during the conflict between Japan and China in Shanghai. 200,000 comfort women came from territories occupied by Japan prior to and during WW2. At the comfort stations throughout Asia, soldiers "took" the girls 10-30 times per day. Physical abuse was unrestrained, with soldiers beating and branding women with hot irons, or cutting them with swords.
(ohmynews.com)
Japanese who think that Tokyo should apologize for comfort women outnumber those who think otherwise
Japanese who think that Tokyo should apologize for drafting Asian woman as sex slaves for the Imperial Army in the Second World War outnumber those who think differently for the first time, a poll reveals. The Northeast Asian History foundation commissioned a poll, which showed that 48.9% in Tokyo said Japan should apologize to the comfort women, while 30.3% said it does not need to. When the survey began in 2007, just 38.4% said Tokyo should say sorry.
(chosun.com)
Comfort woman Gil Won-ok on her third visit to Australia lobbying pressure on Japan
Gil Won-ok was 13 when she arrived at a comfort station for Japanese soldiers, where she was forced to have sex with 20 soldiers a day - for the next 3 years. 200,000 women were forced to be sex slaves for Japanese soldiers, and many of them were taken from Korea, under Japanese colonial rule 1910-1945. Of the 234 Korean women who have publicly talked about their suffering, just 91 are still alive. To urge Japan to officially apologize, the comfort women have held protests in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul every Wednesday since 1992. In 1995 Japan set up an "Asia Women's Fund" to pay to the victims, but it did not get any government funding.
(koreaherald.co.kr)
The Comfort Women: Sexual Violence and Postcolonial Memory in Korea and Japan
The dark history of the women forced into prostitution during the Asia Pacific War and the Second World War came to light in the 1990s when South Korean activists defined it as a war crime. In a new book, Professor of Anthropology C. Sarah Soh suggests a more complex understanding of these "comfort women." In "The Comfort Women" she shows how the current simplistic view of the issue misses the diversity of the women's experiences, the influence of historical factors and the role that Koreans played in facilitating the Japanese comfort women system.
(sfsu.edu)
Comfort women picture book published: 400 photos, painful memories of 67 comform women
A picture book recording 67 survivors of Japan's sexual slavery was recently published. One of the comfort women cited in Li Xiaofang's book is Li Jinyu, who was forced into sexual slavery when she was 14yo. She was seized by the Japanese military when she was playing with her sisters and forced to provide sex for soldiers until her parents ransomed her. "I was tortured for 2 months... After returning home, I was sick for 3 months and could do nothing but lie in bed. During that period, my father was beaten to death." Li was later married, but her husband died 26 years ago. From then on, Li had been earning her living by picking and selling waste.
(xinhuanet.com)
World War II comfort women join forces to demand apology from Japan
A group of comfort women from across Asia demanded that the Japanese government compensate victims, publish a formal apology and provide a balanced account of the issue in history textbooks as the group gathered in Tokyo for the 9th Solidarity Conference for the Issue of Military Sexual Slavery by Japan. Historians say that 200,000 comfort women from across Asia were forced to provide sexual services for Japanese armed forces during World War II. Lee Soo-San, a former sex slave who was forced to join a military brothel at the age of 16, recalled: "Military men were standing in a long line in front of the room... My body is damaged and full of scars."
(telegraph.co.uk)
Comfort women film - Most Hideous Crimes against Humanity
The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) has finished a documentary film about Japan's use of Korean sexual slaves in World War II. The DPRK charged Japan of forcing a huge number of Korean women to become sex slaves after occupying the Korean Peninsula, citing documents and testimonies. The film "Most Hideous Crimes against Humanity in the 20th Century" was made by the Korean Documentary and Scientific Film Studio. It is estimated 100,000-200,000 Korean women were coerced to become comfort women for Japanese soldiers in World War II.
(xinhuanet)
Historian: Comfort women used to prevent revolt in Imperial Army
The Japanese military used sex slaves to satisfy displeased frontline soldiers and discourage military revolt, historian Yoshiaki Yoshimi said. "The Japanese soldiers were in a war of aggression with no promising future in sight. They never knew when they would return home. They were not taken care of well... The Japanese Imperial Army feared most that the simmering discontentment of the soldiers could explode into a riot and revolt. That is why it provided women." Yoshimi found comfort women records at a library of the Defense Agency in Tokyo in 1990s, establishing for the first time that the Japanese Army ran "comfort stations."
(yonhapnews)
Canada urges Japan to apologise about 200,000 comfort women
Canada's parliament has passed a symbolic non-binding motion calling on Japan to apologise for forcing 200,000 women to serve as World War II sex slaves. Olivia Chow said the episode constituted "crimes against humanity". In 1993 Japan published an official apology over comfort women, but parliament never approved it. The motion calls on Japan to "take full responsibility for the involvement of the Japanese Imperial Forces in the system of forced prostitution". It must offer "a formal and sincere apology expressed in the Diet to all of those who were victims". Japan's failure to apologise and issue compensation remains a problem in relations with the nations involved.
(bbc)
Comfort women take fight to Canada
A Chinese former "comfort woman" flew to Canada to place pressure on the Canadian parliament to pass a bill urging Japan to apologize to women forced into sexual slavery during World War II. The Dutch parliament endorsed a similar resolution, and the US House of Representatives approved a similar resolution in July. Liu Mianhuan was joined by 3 other comfort women from South Korea, the Netherlands and the Philippines, and is scheduled to take part in a series of events to raise public awareness among Canadians. The events have been organized by the Global Alliance for Preserving the History of World War II in Asia.
(chinadaily)
Former comfort women emerge from lonely isolation (Article no longer available from the original source)
They were raped, forced to endure months or years as "comfort women" by Japanese soldiers during World War II. Today Filipina survivors of that horrendous experience have banded together to support each other and ensure that their suffering is not forgotten. In Roxas a group was set up in 2000 by women who came forward to declare their painful wartime histories. It has now 100 members, of whom 75 are former comfort women. The others are mostly their daughters, like Chalito Longanillya. She says that she cannot forget the words her father would shout at her mother when he drank too much: "You are nothing but the leftovers of Japanese soldiers."
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Comfort woman Lee Mak Dal delivers testimony (Article no longer available from the original source)
Lee Mak Dal was deceived by the Japanese soldiers who came to her village, they told her that she would be given a task in a factory. She was then shipped to Keelung, Taiwan, where she was confined in a house for the next 6 years. "There were a number of girls there already... When a soldier came in, I would cry, and he ripped off my clothes, yelled at me, then hurt me." The women were forced to accommodate as many as 50 soldiers each day. The war crime remains largely unresolved, as the Japanese government has yet to take responsibility for its military`s coercion of women into sexual slavery.
(yaledailynews)
Comform women serving up to 60 American soldiers a day after WWII
"They took my clothes off. I was so small, they were so big, they raped me easily. I was bleeding, I was only 14 ... I can smell the men, I hate men." - Kang Soon-ae, abducted at age 13 by the Japanese military. Some say it's dishonest to call for a Japanese apology on comfort women issue while ignoring a similar practice by the U.S. military. The first brothel, known as the Babe Garden or Komachien, opened on Sept. 20, 1945. Troops paid upfront and were given tickets. Each woman had intercourse with 15-60 men a day. According to a memoir by an RAA official, the agency employed 70,000 comfort women to service the 350,000 U.S. troops occupying Japan.
(mysanantonio)
Former Wartime Comfort Woman Speaks (Article no longer available from the original source)
World War II military rape camp survivor Yong-soo Lee demonstrated that the Japanese military may have tried to kill her spirit, but they could not kill her pride - Nor could they silence her forever. She was lured from home at age 16. Lee and other girls were taken by train to a place called Anju, where they were beaten and forced to work in the fields. Later, the girls were taken to Dailan in China to be sent somewhere by ships. The girls were raped during the voyage to somewhere in Taiwan where the "comfort station" was located. At the facility, she was forced to serve 4-5 soldiers everyday, even when she was having her period.
(nichibeitimes)
Japanese say wartime comfort women were just camp followers
Japanese conservatives protested against US demands for a apology over military brothels, saying the women were not sex slaves but camp followers. History professor Shoichi Watanabe: "If America keeps saying this is a human rights issue, then what were the indiscriminate bombings on Tokyo and other cities?" The Japanese activists say the resolution is based on wrong information. Kimindo Kusaka said women from Japan went to brothels, but a shortage led to Koreans recruiting women. "They paid when they recruited the girls. It was probably a severe blow to the girls, but it was their dads who betrayed them. It was their moms who betrayed them."
(chineseinvancouver.ca)
Museum to World War II comfort women opens in Shanghai
The museum dedicated to "comfort women" opened at Shanghai Normal University. Guests of honor were 3 comfort women, who attended the opening ceremony and delivered a speech recounting their ordeals. As well as hearing the women's accounts, visitors were able to look at 48 display boards and 80 objects relating to the period. "The wooden sculptures of Mount Fuji taken from the Daiichi Salon in Shanghai, the world's first comfort station set up by the Japanese, is one of the most valuable items on display," Su Zhiliang. Other exhibits include accounts by comfort women; the disinfectants Lei Guiying took with her when she fled the brothel in Nanjing.
(chinadaily)
Memoir of japanese comfort woman tells of hell for women
Sold by her father into prostitution at age 17, Suzuko Shirota followed Japan's troops around the Pacific during WW2. After Japan's surrender, she returned and US troops became her clientele. She became a drug addict, was poverty-stricken and institutionalized for decades. Though historians believe there were tens of thousands more Japanese like her, Shirota is the only Japanese "comfort woman" to have come forward and tell her story. Now, Japan's government is trying to revise that story. Abe and Japanese conservatives claim that, "in the narrow sense," the women weren't coerced: No one held a gun to Shirota's head. But, then again, no one needed to.
(chinadaily)
Chinese woman breaks silence on comfort women horror
Zhou Fenying is a living witness to the dark history that still poisons China's relations with Japan more than 60 years after World War II. When Zhou was 22, Japanese soldiers came to her village, grabbed her and her sister-in-law and carted them off to a military brothel. Now she has broken decades of silence to speak of her traumatic experience as a "comfort woman" - the euphemism the invading Japanese used to describe women forced into sex slavery. "If it were you, wouldn't you hate them? Of course I hate them. But after the war, all the Japanese went home. I'm already so old. I think they are all dead by now."
(asiaone)
Japanese denial angers Australian comfort woman Jan Ruff-O'Herne
Jan Ruff-O'Herne, who was forced into sex slavery in WWII, says she's trembling with anger at a Japanese government ad denying the atrocities. The ad seeks to share "the truth with the American people" about the 200,000 comfort women. "No historical document has ever been found by historians or research organisations that positively demonstrates that women were forced against their will into prostitution by the Japanese army," the ad said under the title "THE FACTS". Ruff-O'Herne: "My esteem for the Japanese Government has completely gone down the drain. I am so angry that after all these years and so much proof they could do that."
(theage)
U.S. military report shows Japan paid some WW2 comfort women
Some Asian women working at brothels for occupying Japanese forces during World War II were employed and paid by owners under contract, the Sankei newspaper reported, citing a U.S. military report declassified 3 decades ago. 20 Korean women working as conform women for the Japanese military were recruited in exchange for money and paid, according to the report written in 1944 by the U.S. military's intelligence division. The report was based on an interrogation of a Japanese owner of the establishment. Japanese historian Yoshimi Yoshiaki estimated in a 1995 book that 200,000 women served in 2,000 so-called comfort stations across Asia.
(bloomberg)
American GIs used comfort women after World War II
Japan's abhorrent practice of enslaving women to provide sex for its troops in WWII has a little-known sequel: After its surrender Japan set up a similar "comfort women" system for American GIs. An AP review of historical documents shows American authorities permitted the official brothel system to operate despite reports that women were being coerced into it. The Americans also had full knowledge by then of Japan's atrocious treatment of women. On August 28, 1945, first troops arrived in Atsugi, by nightfall the troops found the RAA's first brothel. "... I was surprised to see 500 or 600 soldiers standing in line on the street," Seiichi Kaburagi wrote.
(heraldsun)
Testimony shows Comfort Women were forcibly sent to brothels
Shinzo Abe has not accepted Japanese responsibility for sending women and girls to brothels because he claims there was no evidence of coercion. But many cases submitted to Tokyo courts contain testimonies that contradict this. The following are answers given by a Japanese lieutenant in Jan 1946. Q: Some witnesses said you raped women and sent them to military barracks for more sexual assault from Japanese soldiers. (A) I built a brothel for my soldiers and I used it too. (Q) Did the women accept being sent to the brothel? (A) Some accepted it and others did not. (Q) How many women lived there? (A) Six. (Q) How many women were sent against their will? (A) Five.
(donga)
War trial shows Japan military ordered to set up brothel in Indonesia
A Japanese man convicted in a 1946 military tribunal for forcing women to work in a brothel in Indonesia was found at the time to have set up the brothel on instruction from Japanese occupation authorities, documents showed. The man received the instruction to open the brothel for civilians in Jakarta in 1943 and lodged an objection but later obeyed the order after it was repeated, according to the documents obtained by Taichiro Kajimura. Although the man was a civilian and the brothel was for civilians, the documents provide new evidence of the Japanese military's involvement. Some women were actually arrested and detained by authorities after trying to quit.
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Japan's divisive comfort women fund
Asian nations claim Japan has not faced up to its WW2 brutality, but the Japanese have made at least some efforts to heal the scars. One initiative is the Asian Women's Fund which, until it wound up recently, offered compensation to "comfort women", the women forced to work as sex slaves for the Japanese Imperial Army. From the start, there was controversy: Some right-wingers were opposed to anything that offered compensation or an apology. Some activists complained that this was not an official compensation. Some facts: $4.7m was raised in donations from the Japanese people. $6.5m in taxpayers' money was provided to pay for medical fees.
(bbc)
In Japan, a Historian Stands by Proof of Wartime Sex Slavery
15 years ago historian Yoshiaki Yoshimi grew fed up with denials that the military had set up and run brothels. So he went to the Defense Agency`s library and combed through documents from the 1930s. In just two days, he found a rare trove that uncovered the military`s direct role, including documents that carried the seals of high-ranking Imperial Army officers. A red-faced Japanese govt acknowledged that the Japanese state itself had been responsible. The backlash came from nationalist politicians led by Shinzo Abe, an obscure lawmaker at the time, who lobbied to rescind the 1993 admission. Their goal finally seemed close at hand after Mr. Abe became PM.
(nytimes)
Japan PM apology on comfort women - unlikely to satisfy his critics
Japan's PM Shinzo Abe has apologised in parliament for the country's use of women as sex slaves during World War II. The apology comes after he was criticised for previous comments casting doubt on whether the women were coerced. Mr Abe said that he stood by a 1993 statement in which Japan acknowledged the imperial army set up and ran brothels for its troops. "As I frequently say, I feel sympathy for the people who underwent hardships, and I apologise for the fact that they were placed in this situation at the time."
(bbc)
Viewpoints: Abe World War II comfort women row
Japan's PM Shinzo Abe has said there is no evidence that women were forced to become comfort women by the Japanese army. His remarks are going to have a huge impact on Japan's relations, because the memories of the colonisation are still fresh in Korean people's minds. One woman living in the House of Sharing told how she was sold by her step-father, how brutally she was treated by soldiers and how she was rejected by society and family. She then answered a question from a Japanese student, who asked what the young Japanese generation could do to put her mind at peace. Her answer was: "A formal apology and compensation from the Japanese government."
(bbc)
Japan's 1993 apology to World War II comfort women
PM Shinzo Abe has said he stands by a 1993 apology, known as the "Kono Statement" after Yohei Kono. "The Government of Japan has been conducting a study on the issue of wartime comfort women since Dec 1991. ... As a result of the study which indicates that comfort stations were operated in extensive areas for long periods, it is apparent that there existed a great number of comfort women. Comfort stations were operated in response to the request of the military authorities of the day. The then Japanese military was, directly or indirectly, involved in the establishment and management of the comfort stations and the transfer of comfort women..."
(abc)
Australian comfort woman seeks apology
An Australian woman forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese during World War 2 will appear before a US Congressional hearing seeking an apology for her treatment. Jan Ruff O'Herne was 19 when she was seized from a PoW camp and forced into a brothel to become one of hundreds of thousands of "comfort women". She was "raped day and night" by Japanese soldiers for 3 months during the war. "We were just military sex slaves. They called us comfort women but it was just a horrific experience. An apology will give us back our dignity. You can't imagine the shame that we have lived with."
(smh)
Congress to hear testimony of three World War II Comfort women
Three women who were forced into sexual slavery by Japanese soldiers will testify before a U.S. committee for the resolution calling on Tokyo to apologize for the practice. Comfort women is a Japanese euphemism for the 200,000 women forced to provide sex for Japan's soldiers at battle-zone brothels during World War II. Witnesses include experts on the issue and three comfort women: a Dutch-born Jan Ruff O'Herne and Koreans Lee Yong-soo and Kim Koon-ja. In 1993 Japan acknowledged a state role in the wartime program and Japanese leaders have sent letters of apology to 285 of the women, along with funds collected by the Asian Women's Fund.
(reuters.com)
Comfort woman exhibition exposes darkness in East Timor
Ines de Jesus was a young girl during WW2 when she was forced to become a sex slave, "comfort woman," for Japanese troops in the then Portuguese colony of East Timor. By day, she carried out menial labor, and each night was raped by 4-8 soldiers. While horrific, her experience with sexual abuse under military occupation is by no means unusual among East Timorese women, as an exhibition at the Women's Active Museum on War and Peace in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward makes clear. The exhibition combines testimony from witnesses with photos and other documentary evidence to provide a picture of the violence inflicted on women 1942-1945.
(japantimes)
See also:
Japanese Atrocities in WWII
Women & Horror
Women in World War II .