INTRODUCTION

‘Comfort women’ were young women of various ethnic and national backgrounds who became sex slaves for the Japanese Imperial Army before and during World War II. Over a fifteen-year period, the comfort system implemented the rape and sexual enslavement of women from Japanese colonies and occupied territories. Although the exact number of comfort women is unknown, most scholars agree that between 80,000 and 200,000 women were kidnapped, forcibly drafted, or deceived into sexual slavery. A recent study estimates that as many as 400,000 women might have been victimised. Of these women, about 80% were Korean. As part of the overall Japanese war effort, the comfort system was administered by the Japanese military, as well as by Japan's Home Ministry and other Ministries.

Toward the end of the war, Japanese troops sought to expunge traces of the comfort system by slaughtering the women. Soldiers rounded up most of the women and shot them indiscriminately, or drove them into trenches and bombed the sites. Sometimes they used the women as bullet shields or abandoned them to fend for themselves. Only 30% of the women survived. Those who did survive the war suffered years of isolation: many remained unmarried and did not go back to their families due to feelings of guilt and shame. A 1998 survey indicates that ‘90 percent of surviving comfort women are not married, live in poverty, and suffer from physical and psychological diseases.’ Most significantly, former comfort women did not speak of their experiences, even with friends and families. While the victims kept silent, both the Korean and Japanese governments suffered from a collective amnesia. Neither party broached the issue during their frequent diplomatic interactions following the war.

In 1991, Kim Hak Sun, a former comfort woman who had served in a comfort station in China, finally broke the silence that spanned half a century by bringing a lawsuit against the Japanese government to claim compensation for her sufferings. Although the Japanese government initially denied any involvement in the comfort system, Professor Yoshimi Yoshiaki's fortuitous discovery of relevant documents at the National Institute for Defense compelled the administration officially to recant its denial. In an attempt to appease the international community, the Japanese government initiated a private fund to provide financial assistance to former comfort women.