Japan Press Weekly

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2013 June 19 - 25 [HISTORY]

New evidence showing ex-Army’s involvement in ‘comfort women’ unearthed

Akahata on June 23 learned that a number of contraceptives had been unearthed from former Japanese Imperial Army’s command caves in Okinawa, which will serve as evidence to show military involvement in having operated “comfort women” stations.

The excavation site includes the remains of underground shelters of the Garrison HQ for the Japanese 32nd Army in Haebaru Town near Naha City on mainland Okinawa. In that town, 3,505 or 40% of the population had been killed in the Battle of Okinawa (March 20-June 23 in 1945).

An excavation and research team said that it found 127 scorched condoms from 11 bunkers, and that they seemed to be Army-supplied items kept in wooden boxes in the same way as medicines also unearthed at the site.

In addition to the underground shelters, many Army facilities were located in Haebaru Town where three military comfort stations are confirmed to have existed.

Today, such politicians as Prime Minister Abe Shinzo and Japan Restoration Party co-head Hashimoto Toru are under fire in Japan and abroad for their repeated distortion of historical facts regarding the comfort women issue. The international community views the fact that the then Japanese military had engaged in the establishment and management of comfort stations to be inhumane.