Delayed Justice: The Case of the Japanese Imperial Military Sex Slaves

Abstract

DELAYED JUSTICE: THE CASE OF THE JAPANESE IMPERIAL MILITARY SEX SLAVES Chin Kim* Stanley S. Kim** I. INTRODUCTION On April 17, 1998, the Shimonoseki Branch of the Yamaguchi District Court in Japan ordered the Japanese govern- ment to pay Y300,000.00 (equivalent to U.S $2,270.00) each to three South Korean Jugun ianfu, or military comfort women, 1 who were forced to provide Imperial Japanese soldiers sexual service during World War 11.2 The court ruled that upon exami- nation of the evidence, the comfort women system was outright discrimination based upon gender and ethnicity, which was in this case Korean. The court further found that the system vio- * Professor of Law Emeritus, California Western School of Law, San Diego, California; J.S.D., Yale; Former member of editorial Board, AMERICAN JOURNAL OF COMPARATIVE LAW. ** B.A., Oberlin College; Currently in MBA/JD Program, University of Illi- nois, Urbana-Champaign, Illinois. The authors dedicate this article to the members of the KAN-PU SAIBAN 0 SHIEN SURU KAI (The Organization that Renders Support for the Kan-Pu Trial) whose composition includes Christians, young Korean residents in Japan, and grass- roots activists concerned with women's rights. The authors express their gratitude to Kiyoshi Wakukawa, Esq., Tokyo, Japan, who obtained useful documents from Seita Yamamoto Esq., who is one of the attor- neys for the plaintiffs in the Kan-Pu trial and Shinsuke Kimura, Esq., Tokyo, Japan. The authors are also grateful to Barbara Glennan, Esq., of California Western School of Law Library who secured relevant information for them. 1. Jugun means attached (or accompanying or following) the military. The word Ian (comfort) is adequate to convey the meaning that the soldiers who re- ceived sexual pleasure but quite contrary to express Fu (women) who are actually sex slaves of the soldiers to endure the forced prostitution and sexual subjugation with continuous rape on an everyday basis during the war. 2. KAN-PU SAIBAN HANKETSUBUN JENBUN-KENKOGUKAWA SAISHU JUNBI SHOMEN SHUROKU [WRITTEN JUDGMENT IN ITS ENTIRETY - INCLUSION OF FINAL PREPATORY DOCUMENTS By PLAINTIFFS] 46 (Hanabusa Toshio, ed., 1998) [herein- after HANABUSA].