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Abstract
This article analyses the "comfort women" issue that is weakening the relationship between Japan and the Republic of Korea (ROK), which the U.S. fears may threaten their trilateral security partnership. It discusses the facts and legal terminology for imperial Japan's system of sexual slavery in the 1930s and World War II. It reviews the history of imperial Japan's annexation of Korea and the postwar years when the U.S sought to strengthen Japan to counter the rise of Communism. It shows that Japan's postwar conservatives engaged in audacious denialism for its crimes against humanity that it repeats today. It compares Germany's path to reconciliation with its former enemies with Japan's failure to do the same. Right-wing backlash derailed Japan, while Germany repaired its relationships through a process of apologies, reparations, memorialization, and other significant efforts that showed genuine contrition and acceptance of responsibility. The 2015 Statements by Japan and the ROK failed to meet international standards for adequate reparations. The UN has stated repeatedly to Japan that reparations must be victim-centered and comprehensive. The most effective solution to end friction between Japan and ROK is that Japan genuinely apologizes and provides sufficient reparations, according to international standards. The most likely solution will be the continuation of the status quo. The strengthening of human rights will ultimately side with the comfort women/girls.
Key Words: "comfort women," sexual slavery, Japan-ROK relations, trilateral security, reparations, sovereign immunity
Introduction
Watching young men in a Tokyo street taunting an 86-year-old woman in a wheelchair, yelling that she is a whore and should go home to South Korea, is disconcerting in the 2016 documentary The Apology. Seeing a young Japanese man stand up in a Washington, D.C., audience and brazenly denounce the award-winning film to its director1 as lies told by prostitutes against the Japanese government is astonishing. His passionate anger in defense of Japan matched the intensity of the audience's grief on behalf of the comfort women, Japan's brutally treated sex slaves in World War II.
The comfort women issue has remained a serious obstacle to a good relationship between South Korea and Japan, despite the decades that have passed since 1945. It is a top concern of the United States (U.S.), which views their trilateral relationship as key...