LOREN RESOLUTION ASKS JAPAN TO COMPENSATE COMFORT WOMEN

Sen. Loren Legarda yesterday filed a resolution in the Senate urging the Japanese government to "formally acknowledge, apologize and accept historical responsibility" for sexual slavery during the Second World War and to compensate the "comfort women."

At the same time, she filed a bill requiring the Department of Education to include in school textbooks accounts of "the lives and heroism of Filipino comfort women during the Japanese occupation."

She lamented that history textbooks in the elementary, high school and collegiate levels contain only "limited information, if at all, about the offenses and human rights violations committed by Japanese Imperial Forces upon Filipino women.

Timing her actions with the observance of International Women's Month, Loren cited a report of the United Nations revealing that the government of Japan organized the "subjugation and kidnapping of young women for the sole purpose of sexual servitude." These women victims, including those in the Philippines, became known as the "comfort women" of lonely Japanese soldiers.

Many Filipino "comfort women" who have survived the ravages of war and old age have sought compensation to the Japanese government for the "sexual coercion" of its soldiers during World War II. But while the Japanese government has apologized, it has not given compensation to the comfort women, among whom only a handful is left in the Philippines.

Loren noted that according to the UN report on Violence Against Women submitted to the UN Sub-Commission on Human Rights in Geneva on August 14, 1998, the "enslavement of comfort women was officially commissioned and orchestrated by the Government of Japan to include gang rape, forced abortions, sexual violence, human trafficking and numerous other crimes against humanity."

She added, "many comfort women were eventually killed or forced to commit suicide after the cessation of hostilities. As many as 200,000 women were enslaved, many of whom have passed away and only a few survive today."

Loren also stated that over the years "Japan has made concrete progress in recognizing and atoning for its past actions. It also supported the 2000 UN Security Council Resolution on Women, Peace and Security. However, Loren deplored, Japanese textbooks "seek to understate the tragedy of the comfort women and other Japanese war crimes during World War II."

Loren also pointed out that on July 31, 2007, the US House of Representatives passed unanimously a resolution calling on Japan to formally apologize "in a clear and unequivocal manner for the sexual slavery of comfort women." Similar resolutions were passed by the Canada House of Commons and the Dutch parliament.

"Whereas," Loren stated, "the Filipino comfort women are continuously struggling for formal apology and legal compensation from the Japanese government."

She thus called on the Philippine senate to urge the Philippine government to urgently ask the government of Japan to offer "the comfort women still alive today some form of direct moral and financial compensation for the suffering caused them."

She stressed that the Philippine government "has a moral duty to work for the restoration of the dignity and honor of former Filipino comfort women especially while they are still living, as a concrete manifestation of our recognition and commitment to the principles of human rights, gender quality and peace."