China News Service, Shanghai, September 19, title: The evidence is conclusive, why is Japan still trying to deny the crime of forcibly recruiting “comfort women”?
China News Agency reporter Xu Jing
In September, Shanghai Normal University was extremely quiet. Affected by the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the only Chinese “comfort women” history museum in mainland China with the theme of preserving evidence of the tragic circumstances of “comfort women” has not yet opened outside the school.
The various relics and donated-related cultural relics of the Japanese military’s comfort station sites collected by Professor Su Zhiliang, the director of the Chinese Comfort Women’s Research Center of SMU, and his team in the past 30 years are all stored in the museum. There are condoms and stars used by Japanese soldiers during the war. Secret ointment; the passport used by the victimized survivors when they go to Japan to file a lawsuit; the documents for the victimized survivors to attend the hearing abroad and the indictment for compensation to Japan, etc.
“The museum opened on October 22, 2016. In recent years, more than 500 new collections have been added, including maps, photos, comfort supplies and important components. Some collections are quite rare, such as those collected from Tokyo two years ago. There are two condoms used by the Japanese Navy with the Japanese Navy’s seal on the outer packaging.” Su Zhiliang said that the museum currently has about 3,000 items in its collection. A large number of historical materials and exhibits have proved that the “comfort women” system was a national crime in Japan during the war. It is an anti-humanitarian act.
Outside the museum, on the lawn in front of the Wenyuan building quietly stands a statue of a Chinese and Korean “comfort woman” peaceful girl representing thousands of victims of the “comfort woman” system during World War II. The young girls under the sun, they sit quietly, full of power.
According to research conducted by the Research Center, during the Second World War, about 200,000 women in China were captured by the Japanese army and served as sex slaves in the Japanese army. Shanghai was the birthplace of the Japanese army’s criminal “comfort women” system during World War II, and it was also the city with the most comfort stations for the Japanese army.
Beginning in 1993, Su Zhiliang led the team, based on wartime Japanese and puppet files, Japanese documents and books in China, memories of Japanese military veterans, wartime Chinese press materials, and testimony from Chinese victims and witnesses. The comfort station in Shanghai has conducted continuous surveys and statistics. The “Evidence: Secrets Revealed in 172 Comfort Stations in Shanghai” based on the investigation has become a strong evidence of the atrocities of the “comfort women” system carried out by the Japanese militarists.
In recent years, the research team of the research center has visited Hunan, Hainan, Shanxi and other places for investigations. It has been confirmed that there are currently 14 living victims in mainland China. Since 2018, the Research Center has established and used the “Comfort Women Research and Assistance” project fund to continue to increase the life, medical and funeral assistance for victims, and promote various academic research.
Japan’s actions to deny, justify, or downplay the issue of “comfort women” are still widespread, including calling survivors “prostitution women who collect money and sell themselves” and attack the validity of testimony and other evidence. On April 27 this year, the cabinet meeting of the Japanese government confirmed the statement of defense, which clearly stated that the term “comfort women accompanying the military” will be prohibited in textbooks in the future. On September 8, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan approved five publishers’ applications to modify or delete the expressions of “comfort women” in textbooks, and agreed to change “comfort women with the military” to “comfort women” and to change “compulsory take away”. For “compulsory mobilization” or “expropriation”…
In March this year, the “Reiwa Three-Year Liberal Democratic Party Movement Guidelines” issued by the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan pointed out: “On the issue of’historical war’ and territorial and sovereignty, we will adopt diversified methods to strengthen strategic public announcements.” What is “history” war”? Zhu Yitian, director of the Institute of Social Development of East China University of Science and Technology, who has been paying attention to “comfort women” for a long time, explained that the essence of the “historical war” released in April 2014 is a deliberate denial of historical facts such as “comfort women” and war responsibilities. , And demanded that the Japanese should bravely stand up, take the initiative to include China and South Korea as the main targets of the controversy, and use history as a weapon to actively engage in the war.
“The’historical war’ jointly promoted by the ruling party in Japan and the right-wing forces is an obvious trend of the arrogance of historical revisionism in Japan, and it is also extremely closely related to political changes and diplomatic strategies.” Zhu Yitian reminded that the largest ruling party in Japan The expression of “historical war” appeared in the official documents of the People’s Republic of China, and it was determined as a key work policy for 2021, which requires a high degree of vigilance. (over)
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