Asia Women's Fund Revisited

Abstract

The Asian Women's Fund's atonement project for former comfort women set a new vision of Japan in which the people along with the Japanese government proactively participate in performing the moral responsibility for the suffering of former comfort women in cross-boundary and cross-generational ways. This article argues that the Fund's imperfect reconciliation with former comfort women particularly in Taiwan and South Korea was due to the misunderstanding about moral responsibility as an evasion of the Japanese government's legal responsibility and due to the inadequate exercise of political and administrative leadership. Underneath these factors lie the intertwined root causes of the limited availability of facts on the issue of comfort women and the ideologically driven discourse. The article suggests the following measures as a further atonement project: strong political leadership to present the clear meaning of moral responsibility, cooperation with the governments and support groups in the victims' countries, and an international truth investigation.