Atrocity victims await compensation
Atrocity victims await compensation
TOKYO (Reuter): Survivors of Japanese World War II atrocities
from 13 countries across the Asia-Pacific region gathered in
Tokyo yesterday in a combined attempt to get compensation from
the Japanese government.
"This is a question of the honor of the Japanese people, and
the honor of the Japanese government," said Tasrip Rahardjo,
leader of a group of Indonesian former militiamen press-ganged
into service in the Japanese army.
"The Japanese army robbed us of our basic human rights," said
Filipino Gertrudes Balisalisa, a wheelchair-bound former "comfort
woman" forced to serve as a sex slave in army-run battlefield
brothels.
"The only way we can get them back is through compensation,"
he added.
The representatives comprise a total of 50 from Hong Kong,
Indonesia, South Korea, Malaysia, the Marshall Islands, Nauru,
Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Russia's Sakhalin island,
Singapore, Taiwan, Britain and the United States.
They spoke at a news conference ahead of meetings with Chief
Cabinet Secretary Kozo Igarashi, Foreign Ministry officials and
Lower House speaker Takako Doi.
The group was to hand Igarashi a letter to Prime Minister
Tomiichi Murayama demanding that Japan first send fact-finding
missions and obtain information on survivors.
Survivors from Nauru, the Marshall Islands and Papua New
Guinea were in Tokyo for the first time.
About 30,000 of 100,000 Indonesian militiamen perished on
Pacific island battlefields helping the Japanese army. Taiwanese
soldiers in the Japanese military were never paid, compensated or
given pensions.
Japan's wartime government cheated Hong Kong residents by
forcing them to exchange their cash for military notes, now
worthless.
Sakhalin
Hundreds of thousands of Koreans were brought to Japan as
forced laborers, many of whom perished as a result of harsh
working conditions. Some were taken to Sakhalin and abandoned
there when the territory reverted to Soviet rule.
Japanese army units conducted massacres in Malaysia, Papua New
Guinea and the Marshalls.
Some 40 percent of Nauru islanders were taken to the Japanese
navy base at Truk Island, where many died.
British prisoners-of-war were forced to dig mass graves for
massacre victims, set to work on the "Death Railway" between
Thailand and Burma and then forced to work in mines in Taiwan.
"At least we could fight," said Jack Edwards, a former British
prisoner-of-war and now a resident of Hong Kong. "But these
sisters (comfort women), they were not even given a chance to
fight."
Aleutian natives from the north Pacific island of Attu were
incarcerated in Hokkaido, Japan, where many died.
The representatives were invited to Tokyo by a coalition of
some 12 Japanese citizens' groups which is to host the two-day
annual International Forum of War Reparation for the Asian-
Pacific Region, opening today.
What had been separate moves to demand compensation for the
atrocities from the Japanese government were now being combined,
Japanese organizers said.
Almost 50 years after World War II, Japan has yet to come to
terms with its bloody record of massacre, rape, plunder and gross
mistreatment of people under its yoke.