Japan Press Weekly

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2013 June 12 - 18 [CIVIL RIGHTS]

Young lawyers join legal battle against SDF monitoring of public

Akahata ‘Current’ column

Many young lawyers were present at a rally held on June 8 in Sendai City, which was to support a citizens’ lawsuit against the Self-Defense Forces’ surveillance activities of the public. The court hearings were reported to participants by a young lawyer who started his career as a lawyer in January.

In June 2007, the Japanese Communist Party obtained and revealed SDF internal documents indicating that SDF intelligence security units had been monitoring citizens’ peace movements. During the six years since then, citizens’ tenacious struggles to defend democracy have been advancing.

The lawsuit was filed by 107 citizens in the Tohoku region, seeking suspension of the spying activities and calling for state compensation due to the invasion of privacy. In March last year, the Sendai District Court ruled the SDF surveillance as illegal and ordered the national government to pay compensation to some of the plaintiffs. The suit has been passed on to a high court.

This landmark victory was helped brought about by a legal group of 111 lawyers who voluntarily work for the legal battle. “We are happy to see our young colleagues joining in this case one after another. They are the ones who lead the court deliberations,” said a veteran lawyer.

The groups of plaintiffs and lawyers are both led by those who are over 80 years old. Supported by the youth, they are fighting in court to block a re-emergence of the prewar government repression of people’s freedom of speech.