September 11, 2024

Akahata learned on September 10 that the National Diet Library (NDL) decided to send to the Cabinet Secretariat documents regarding a prewar case where 15 women were abducted in Nagasaki Prefecture and transported to a Japanese military comfort station in Shanghai, China.

The documents include the judgement of guilty finalized by prewar/wartime Japan’s top court, the Great Court of Cassation (Daishin-in).

The NDL’s decision came in response to a request which Japanese Communist Party lawmaker Kami Tomoko made in July. Kami, in her request, asked for the Library’s cooperation for the Cabinet Secretariat project to collect and store “comfort women”-related materials which has been carried out in accordance with the 1993 “Kono Statement”.

Kami commented on the NDL’s decision and pointed out that the Daishin-in’s judgement can be considered as an evidence proving that the women were forced into serving as “comfort women”. She said that in line with the “Kono Statement” which admitted to the imperial Japanese military’s involvement and coercion in the establishment and management of the comfort stations and the forcible transfer of women, the government should retract opinions and policies that deny the coercive nature of the “comfort women” issue without delay.