1993 Kono Statement facing an existential crisis

Posted on : 2013-08-05 15:43 KST Modified on : 2019-10-19 20:29 KST
20 years after apology was issued, the Abe government working to negate statement
 1993. (News1)
1993. (News1)

By Jeong Nam-ku, Tokyo correspondent

The Kono Statement, which reached the 20th anniversary of its release on Aug. 4, is facing an existential crisis. The statement was an apology and acknowledgment that women from Korea and other countries were coerced into sexual slavery during World War II and that the Japanese army had been involved their coercion.

The current Japanese government, led by Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, took a step back when Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said in May, “we have never said that we would revise the statement.” Nevertheless, a significant number of Japanese politicians, including Abe himself, effectively deny the substance of the statement.

The statement was released by Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono on Aug. 4, 1993, when Kiichi Miyazawa of the Liberal Democratic Party was Prime Minister of Japan.

“Comfort stations were operated in response to the request of the military authorities of the day. The Japanese military was, directly or indirectly, involved in the establishment and management of the comfort stations and the transfer of comfort women,” the statement said.

In regard to the recruitment of the comfort women, the statement said, “their recruitment, transfer, control, etc., were conducted generally against their will, through coaxing, coercion, etc. Undeniably, this was an act, with the involvement of the military authorities of the day, that severely injured the honor and dignity of many women.”

“The Government of Japan would like to take this opportunity once again to extend its sincere apologies and remorse to all those, irrespective of place of origin, who suffered immeasurable pain and incurable physical and psychological wounds as comfort women,” it said.

The statement was released after a movement began in the 1990s for Korea to demand that the truth be revealed and that the Japanese government issue an apology and provide compensation to the victims, and after pressure increased from the international community.

One limitation of the statement was the ambiguity of the Japanese government’s acknowledgment that the comfort women had been forced into sexual service. Nevertheless, the Kono statement became a milestone in Japanese historical consciousness, becoming the cornerstone of the Murayama Statement in 1995, which was an apology for Japanese aggression and colonialism.

While Korea’s surviving comfort women refused to accept the money, Japan also did try to provide compensation to the women after the publication of the Kono Statement, creating the Asian Women’s Fund for this purpose.

One of the leaders of criticism by the conservative and right wing establishment that this is a masochistic historical perspective and of attempts to deny the historical fact of the comfort women’s compulsory sexual service is current Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

During Abe’s first term as prime minister (Sep. 2006-Sep. 2007), he fired the first shot in attempts to amend the Kono Statement, saying, “there is no evidence that the comfort women were forced into sexual slavery.”

But Abe backed down under heavy pressure from the international community. The US House of Representatives even adopted a resolution demanding that the Japanese government acknowledge that the comfort women had been forced to become sexual slaves and to apologize for its involvement.

After Abe became prime minister again after a landslide victory by the Liberal Democratic Party in the general election in Dec. 2012, he tackled the issue again with a vengeance.

During the campaign, Abe said, “the Liberal Democratic Party will need to review the Kono and Murayama Statements again if we gain power.” Once he had become prime minister again, he said he would “release an Abe Statement containing a new historical awareness.”

But once again, he has been forced to retreat after a strong backlash from South Korea and expressions of concern from the international community.

“We have not considered reviewing or revising the Kono Statement,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said on May 7 in an attempt to backpedal. But Abe’s intentions had already been made clear.

In response to a statue of a comfort woman that was unveiled in Glendale, California, Suga said on July 27 that it “didn‘t conform to the Japanese position.”

“We are asking US officials to make the appropriate response,” Suga said.

There is a growing movement to deny that the comfort women were forced into sexual slavery among the conservative establishment in Japan as well.

Toru Hashimoto, Mayor of Osaka and co-leader of the Japan Restoration Party, made the rash statement that “the comfort women were necessary during the war” on May 13.

“Recently, the Kono Statement even provided grounds for the establishment of a statue of a young comfort woman for the Japanese army in Glendale, California” the Yomiuri Shimbun said in an Aug. 1 editorial. “We have no choice but to reconsider the Kono Statement, if only to correct the misconceptions about sexual slaves.”

The Yomiuri Shimbun has the highest circulation of any Japanese newspaper.

“We are in a situation where we must defend the Kono Statement if we are to block Japan’s reckless drive,” said Lee Young-chae, a professor of political science at Keisen University in Japan.

 

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