Japan Press Weekly

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2013 December 4 - 10 [LABOR]

JAL demands apology from harassment victim

A former JAL contract cabin attendant on December 5 revealed at a press conference that the airline is seeking her apology despite a top court order issued to JAL to compensate her for suffering caused by a forcible retirement request and workplace harassment.

The ex-cabin attendant brought a lawsuit against Japan Airlines, claiming that she unfairly suffered an arbitrary termination of her contract in 2010 after experiencing power harassment from her boss and being forced to quit her job.

Her court battle ended with the Supreme Court decision in October this year which upheld the Tokyo High Court ruling ordering JAL to pay 200,000 yen in compensation for damages.

Following the top court decision, the plaintiff’s union, the Japan Airlines Cabin Crew Union, urged the company to apologize to her and take measures to ban power harassment. The JAL management, however, demanded in negotiations with the union that the plaintiff offer an apology to her supervisor and senior colleagues, who had harried her to give up her career and were brought by the company to court as witnesses, insisting that they also had their feelings hurt in court.