2016.04.06
Okinawan’s Taiwan Redress Ruling Reignites Calls for 'Comfort Women' Compensation
【By Nick Horton】
A recent Taiwanese court ruling that found a Japanese man was entitled to compensation over his father’s presumed death during the so-called 228 Incident has reignited calls for Japan to redress the former colony’s few remaining “comfort women.”
In a first for a non-Taiwanese national, the Taipei High Administrative Court ruled on Feb. 17 that 72-year-old Keisho Aoyama, from Urasoe in Okinawa Prefecture, should be paid 6 million New Taiwan dollars (about ¥21 million) by the state-funded Memorial Foundation of 228 over the wrongful death of his father, Eisaki, in 1947.
Aoyama’s father is believed to be one of more than 20,000 people killed in the anti-government uprising that began on Feb. 28 that year, following a crackdown on unauthorized tobacco sales in Taipei, and which inflamed underlying tensions between Taiwanese and the nascent Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government.
Aoyama filed the suit last September following a failed application to the memorial foundation, which rejected his compensation claim on the grounds that Japan had never paid reparations to Taiwanese “comfort women” or soldiers conscripted into the wartime Imperial Japanese Army.
Representatives of two Taipei-based nongovernmental organizations that supported the claim — the Taiwan Association for Human Rights and the Taiwan Okinawa Association — told The Japan Times the case showed that human rights issues should not be treated differently based on nationality.
“There were many Okinawans who lost their lives in 228. This is something that the Taiwanese government — and Taiwanese people — need to know,” said Lee Ming-jun, secretary of the Taiwan Okinawa Association.
“The most important thing for us was not compensation or a question of money at all, but rather the truth: It’s about letting Taiwanese people know the true facts (of the 228 Incident).”
For three other Okinawan families seeking similar compensation from the Taiwanese government over the loss of their relatives in the 228 Incident, Aoyama’s case is a watershed, Lee added.
It is also potentially a turning point for Taiwan’s rapidly shrinking population of former comfort women, who were forced to work in Japanese wartime military brothels.
Their claims for compensation in Japanese courts have been unsuccessful to date, but their demands have been receiving renewed attention in Taiwan since the signing in December of an accord on former comfort women between Japan and South Korea.
The Dec. 28 agreement to “finally and irreversibly resolve” the comfort women issue between the two Northeast Asian neighbors, including a ¥1 billion ($9 million) support fund to be set up by South Korea and funded by Japan, triggered demands within Taiwan for a similar deal for the three remaining Taiwanese ex-comfort women.
However, while Taiwanese Foreign Minister David Lin announced in late December that bilateral communications were proceeding smoothly to resolve the long-standing issue, this was denied on Jan. 5 by Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, who claimed Japan had already dealt with other countries over the issue.
In the wake of this rebuff, Aoyama’s case has become a new rallying point for critics of Japan’s treatment of Taiwanese survivors. During remarks commemorating International Women’s Day on March 8, outgoing Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou contrasted the Japanese government’s inaction on resolving the comfort women issue with the Taiwanese government’s handling of compensation claims by relatives of non-Taiwanese victims of the 228 Incident, citing in particular Aoyama.
Arguing that the Taiwanese wartime comfort women were Japanese citizens at the time, Ma said that Tokyo should treat victims’ claims in the same way as any other Japanese citizen.
“Our government has treated foreign nationals equally (regarding compensation for the 228 Incident), so why can’t the Japanese government do more for its own citizens?”
For the Taiwanese government and citizens’ groups representing Taiwanese former comfort women, the primary issue is not the price tag of a compensation check, but rather the form that reparations take.
According to Kang Shu-hwa, executive director of the Taipei Women’s Rescue Foundation (TWRF) — the only NGO in Taiwan established to support the 58 comfort women cases confirmed since 1992 — although each woman was offered around ¥3 million in compensation from the semigovernmental Asian Women’s Fund in the mid-1990s, this type of nonstate compensation model was firmly rejected by many of the survivors and their supporters.
Instead, the TWRF provided each ama — the Taiwanese word for grandma — with a care allowance worth NT$500,000 (about ¥2 million at the time), which was further supplemented by an extra NT$500,000 per person provided by a Taiwanese government fund.
“We reject the kind of nongovernment organization model of the Asian Women’s Fund. We believe that reparation must come directly from the Japanese government, that the Japanese government must act in its capacity as the Japanese state to directly compensate comfort women,” Kang told The Japan Times.
“For us, the most important aspect of reparation is courtesy and acknowledgment. We’ve received so much support and care from the Taiwanese government and Taiwanese society, and now the most important thing for these ama as they approach the final stages of their lives, is for them to receive an honest and open apology (from Japan).”
By the same token, according to Kang, the Dec. 28 accord is not the right solution for Taiwanese survivors, as it seemed to be mainly a political solution.
“I think that the accord is better seen as a result of political compromise between Japan and South Korea,” she said. “The important thing is for us to understand the situation of the comfort women, so that the next generation of Taiwanese, of Koreans, of Japanese, of Asians, can know how we all move (forward) together, and how to build peace with Japan.”
Echoing the humanitarian message of Lee and supporters of Aoyama’s case, Kang also saw the comfort women issue as a broader one of human rights, and hoped the February court ruling will set a good example for Japan.
“I hope that the Japanese government and Japanese courts can adopt the same attitude when they are faced with resolving the issues of the comfort women and other victims of World War II.”
[The Japanese Times, 2016-04-04]
A recent Taiwanese court ruling that found a Japanese man was entitled to compensation over his father’s presumed death during the so-called 228 Incident has reignited calls for Japan to redress the former colony’s few remaining “comfort women.”
In a first for a non-Taiwanese national, the Taipei High Administrative Court ruled on Feb. 17 that 72-year-old Keisho Aoyama, from Urasoe in Okinawa Prefecture, should be paid 6 million New Taiwan dollars (about ¥21 million) by the state-funded Memorial Foundation of 228 over the wrongful death of his father, Eisaki, in 1947.
Aoyama’s father is believed to be one of more than 20,000 people killed in the anti-government uprising that began on Feb. 28 that year, following a crackdown on unauthorized tobacco sales in Taipei, and which inflamed underlying tensions between Taiwanese and the nascent Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government.
Aoyama filed the suit last September following a failed application to the memorial foundation, which rejected his compensation claim on the grounds that Japan had never paid reparations to Taiwanese “comfort women” or soldiers conscripted into the wartime Imperial Japanese Army.
Representatives of two Taipei-based nongovernmental organizations that supported the claim — the Taiwan Association for Human Rights and the Taiwan Okinawa Association — told The Japan Times the case showed that human rights issues should not be treated differently based on nationality.
“There were many Okinawans who lost their lives in 228. This is something that the Taiwanese government — and Taiwanese people — need to know,” said Lee Ming-jun, secretary of the Taiwan Okinawa Association.
“The most important thing for us was not compensation or a question of money at all, but rather the truth: It’s about letting Taiwanese people know the true facts (of the 228 Incident).”
For three other Okinawan families seeking similar compensation from the Taiwanese government over the loss of their relatives in the 228 Incident, Aoyama’s case is a watershed, Lee added.
It is also potentially a turning point for Taiwan’s rapidly shrinking population of former comfort women, who were forced to work in Japanese wartime military brothels.
Their claims for compensation in Japanese courts have been unsuccessful to date, but their demands have been receiving renewed attention in Taiwan since the signing in December of an accord on former comfort women between Japan and South Korea.
The Dec. 28 agreement to “finally and irreversibly resolve” the comfort women issue between the two Northeast Asian neighbors, including a ¥1 billion ($9 million) support fund to be set up by South Korea and funded by Japan, triggered demands within Taiwan for a similar deal for the three remaining Taiwanese ex-comfort women.
However, while Taiwanese Foreign Minister David Lin announced in late December that bilateral communications were proceeding smoothly to resolve the long-standing issue, this was denied on Jan. 5 by Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, who claimed Japan had already dealt with other countries over the issue.
In the wake of this rebuff, Aoyama’s case has become a new rallying point for critics of Japan’s treatment of Taiwanese survivors. During remarks commemorating International Women’s Day on March 8, outgoing Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou contrasted the Japanese government’s inaction on resolving the comfort women issue with the Taiwanese government’s handling of compensation claims by relatives of non-Taiwanese victims of the 228 Incident, citing in particular Aoyama.
Arguing that the Taiwanese wartime comfort women were Japanese citizens at the time, Ma said that Tokyo should treat victims’ claims in the same way as any other Japanese citizen.
“Our government has treated foreign nationals equally (regarding compensation for the 228 Incident), so why can’t the Japanese government do more for its own citizens?”
For the Taiwanese government and citizens’ groups representing Taiwanese former comfort women, the primary issue is not the price tag of a compensation check, but rather the form that reparations take.
According to Kang Shu-hwa, executive director of the Taipei Women’s Rescue Foundation (TWRF) — the only NGO in Taiwan established to support the 58 comfort women cases confirmed since 1992 — although each woman was offered around ¥3 million in compensation from the semigovernmental Asian Women’s Fund in the mid-1990s, this type of nonstate compensation model was firmly rejected by many of the survivors and their supporters.
Instead, the TWRF provided each ama — the Taiwanese word for grandma — with a care allowance worth NT$500,000 (about ¥2 million at the time), which was further supplemented by an extra NT$500,000 per person provided by a Taiwanese government fund.
“We reject the kind of nongovernment organization model of the Asian Women’s Fund. We believe that reparation must come directly from the Japanese government, that the Japanese government must act in its capacity as the Japanese state to directly compensate comfort women,” Kang told The Japan Times.
“For us, the most important aspect of reparation is courtesy and acknowledgment. We’ve received so much support and care from the Taiwanese government and Taiwanese society, and now the most important thing for these ama as they approach the final stages of their lives, is for them to receive an honest and open apology (from Japan).”
By the same token, according to Kang, the Dec. 28 accord is not the right solution for Taiwanese survivors, as it seemed to be mainly a political solution.
“I think that the accord is better seen as a result of political compromise between Japan and South Korea,” she said. “The important thing is for us to understand the situation of the comfort women, so that the next generation of Taiwanese, of Koreans, of Japanese, of Asians, can know how we all move (forward) together, and how to build peace with Japan.”
Echoing the humanitarian message of Lee and supporters of Aoyama’s case, Kang also saw the comfort women issue as a broader one of human rights, and hoped the February court ruling will set a good example for Japan.
“I hope that the Japanese government and Japanese courts can adopt the same attitude when they are faced with resolving the issues of the comfort women and other victims of World War II.”
[The Japanese Times, 2016-04-04]
