WAM Exhibition: "Comfort Stations in Okinawa & Sexual Violence by U.S. Forces" • June 23, 2012 - July 30, 2013 • Tokyo

Map of military sexual slave stations in Okinawa.

Poster: Women's Active Museum on War and Peace

Kyodo correspondent Keiji Hirano's "Exhibition portrays Okinawa's wartime sex slaves" covers the Women's Active Museum's exhibition on wartime Japanese military sexual slavery and postwar US military sexual assaults in Okinawa. The exhibition's opening in June coincided with the 40th anniversary of Okinawa's ostensible reversion to Japan:

In a yearlong exhibition through next June, the Women's Active Museum on War and Peace shows there were at least 145 "comfort stations" in the islands, at which women not only from Japan but also from Korea and Taiwan were forced to provide sex to Japanese soldiers.

The exhibition, "Comfort Stations in Okinawa and Sexual Violence by U.S. Forces," also introduces testimonies from 300 Okinawa women who were sexually assaulted by U.S. military personnel in the postwar era, although they are believed to be just the tip of the iceberg.

"We hope to show that women have faced sexual violence by military forces in Okinawa in wartime as well as even in the postwar period," said Mina Watanabe, secretary general of the museum known as WAM.

"We expect visitors to the exhibition to be aware this has resulted in Japan's creation of comfort stations and its policy of forcing the bulk of U.S. military bases in Japan on Okinawa," she said.

The findings presented on more than 30 panels at the exhibition are based mainly on decades of research by historians, activists and journalists, who examined documents compiled by the Japanese military and municipalities of Okinawa while collecting testimonies of those who lived near the comfort stations and witnessed the exploitation of women, the organizers said...''

A panel quotes a history book compiled by the municipal government of Yomitan: "There were four Korean comfort women. On holidays, soldiers stood in line (in front of a comfort station) from daytime, leading the village residents to turn their eyes away from them."

A Haebaru resident remembers a girl aged around 13, who served as a nanny in the daytime and as a "comfort woman" in the evening, saying, "She sometimes innocently showed me money that she received from soldiers," another panel indicates.

Comfort stations were built even in remote islands, with Tokashiki Island, now a major diving spot, having seven Korean comfort women aged 16 to 30.

Among them was Bae Bong Gi, who was taken to the island from Korea in 1944, and forced to provide sex under the Japanese name, "Akiko."

She remained in Okinawa even after the end of the war and engaged in marginal work. Suffering headaches and nerve pain in old age, she died in 1991 at the age of 77 without returning home. Another of the seven on Tokashiki, meanwhile, died in a U.S. attack at the end of the war.

While Bae talked about her life in interviews before her death, "many women remained unable to come out," Watanabe said...

The exhibition was also held in Okinawa through mid-July.

The Women's Active Museum of War and Peace opened the summer of 2005, the sixtieth anniversary of Japan's defeat in World War II, to focus on "violence against women during wars and armed conflict, from a gender perspective."

See also "Statement of protest against the sexual assault on an Okinawan woman by a US Marine Corps serviceman, & demand for withdrawal of US Military Forces" posted on September 5, 2012, about a recent protest by Okinawa Women Act Against Military Violence (OWAAMV) of yet another US military sexual assault upon an Okinawan woman (while returning to her home).

Ahn Sehong's "Layer-by-Layer Project" - Gallery Furuto, Tokyo through Sept. 9

Photo: Photographs of the Soul. Courtesy of Ahn Sehong

Ahn Sehong's "Layer by Layer Project: Military Sexual Slavery by Japan During the Second World War" is being exhibited (the second time this year) at Gallery Furuto in Tokyo’s Nerima Ward through Sept. 9.

The exhibition features 36 black-and-white pictures of 12 Korean women who were abandoned in China, after being forced into Japanese military sexual slavery during the Pacific War.

The first exhibition, at Nikon Gallery, encountered rightist backlash, a pattern used to repress controversial views in Japan since the postwar period. Tomoko Otake's Aug. 19 article at The Japan Times details Ahn's experience and gives voice to the photographer's compassionate and humanitarian motivation, just as he gives some voice to these displaced, forgotten victims of military sexual violence and war:

"This is not an issue of Japan-Korea relations," he said. "It's an issue of how war can infringe on the human rights of women who are the most vulnerable members of society. Japanese prostitutes were also taken (to other parts of Asia) as comfort women, and their rights were significantly trampled upon as well."

Toyohiro Mishima's Sept. 4 article at The Asahi explains how the second exhibition came about through the support of Kozo Nagata, a Musashi University professor and Kazuo Tajima, the manager of Gallery Furuto.

Twelve of the photographs are available for viewing at Ahn's website, Photographs of the Soul.

Yoshio Shimoji defends the Japanese Peace Constitution

Yoshio Shimoji's defense (published at The Japan Times on June 14, 2012) of the Japanese Peace Constitution:

...Article 9 is one of the most important provisions in the Japanese Constitution. Three principles of idealism permeate it throughout: pacifism, liberty and democracy. Article 9 embodies man's universal aspirations for peace. I think Article 9 was postwar Japan's manifestation of its deep regret for what it had done during the war.

But look at what the U.S. government has done since Japan's new Constitution was promulgated and came into force in 1947. It has forced Japan to rearm, compelled police reserve forces-turned self-defense forces to act as a real army and, more often than not, called on Japan, either openly or under cover, to revise its Constitution so that Japan could engage in a "collective defense" and fight a global war along with U.S. forces.

All nations, not to mention the U.S. and Kolb's Austria, should add an Article 9-like provision to their constitutions. It's not a worthless article as Kolb suggests. Rather, it's a star of hope every nation should aspire to. Japan should be proud of possessing it.

Read the entire letter here.

Yoshio Shimoji, born in Miyako Island, Okinawa, M.S. (Georgetown University), taught English and English linguistics at the University of the Ryukyus from April 1966 until his retirement in March 2003. He is a contributor to The Japan Times and The Asia-Pacific Journal.

Craig Martin: The LDP's dangerous proposals for revising the Japanese Peace Constitution

Important article on Article 9, "LDP's dangerous proposals for amending antiwar article," by Washburn University School of Law professor Craig Martin, published at The Japan Times on June 6, 2012:

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) published its new draft constitutional amendment proposal in late April. The draft reflects a number of significant changes above and beyond those advanced in the proposal unveiled by the LDP in 2005. The proposal includes a complete overhaul of Article 9, the war-renouncing provision of Japan's so-called Peace Constitution. These changes to Article 9 are important, and on balance, dangerous...

As such, the changes would utterly undermine the normative power of the third pillar of the Japanese constitutional order — that is, the principle of pacifism and nonuse of force. For those who believe that this core principle of Japan's constitution has served it well over the last 65 years, it is important to understand the ramifications, and indeed the real intent, of the LDP's amendment proposals.

Robert Redford: Tell Environmentalists & IUCN: No Base on Jeju Island

Via Robert Redford & Save Jeju Now:

From: Robert Redford

To: All of your people

Subject: Tell Environmentalists & IUCN: No Base on Jeju Island

Dear Friends of Jeju Island,

From September 6-15, some 10,000 environmentalists will converge on Jeju Island to attend the World Conservation Congress (WCC) organized by the oldest environmental organization, the International Union of the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The IUCN’s slogan is that it promotes “a just world that values and conserves nature.” If recent actions are any indication, nothing could be further from the truth.

The WCC will take place only a few minutes away from Gangjeong where the construction of a naval base is threatening one of the planet’s most spectacular soft coral forests and other coastal treasures, assaulting numerous endangered species and destroying a 400-year old sustainable community of local farmers and fishers.

Unfortunately, the IUCN leadership has ignored or whitewashed the naval base.

Instead of condemning the South Korean government’s actions, IUCN Director-General Julia Marton-Lafevre praised its seriously flawed “Environmental Impact Assessment” (EIA) for the base project, which ignored critically endangered species, missed crucial impacts upon 40 species of soft coral, including nine that are seriously endangered, and five that are already protected by CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora). This naval base is being built just 0.13 miles from a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, Tiger Island.

Take action now and sign this petition to the IUCN Director-General, Julia Marton-Lefevre urging the IUCN to condemn the base construction.

While Gangjeong villagers trying to protect their treasured natural resources are subjected to daily police beatings and arrests, the IUCN has still failed to acknowledge the environmental or human-rights violations. One can’t help but wonder if this is because the WCC convention is partly financed by the very corporations building the military base, notably Samsung. Learn more about how you can help support an independent EIA and the villagers' struggle at http://www.savejejunow.org.

Instead of inviting dialogue, the IUCN conference organizers have suppressed it. In an official letter from IUCN leadership – with no explanation -- it blocked the villagers from even having a small information booth at the conference.

You can help give voice to the Gangjeong villagers who have been beaten and silenced by their own government, and now kept out by the world’s largest environmental organization. Add your name to this letter to IUCN Director-General, Julia Marton-Lefevre, to be hand delivered by Gangjeong village Mayor Kang Dong-kyun at the IUCN Congress.

For peace and protection of our planet,

Robert Redford

Actor, Director and Environmental Activist

P.S. Gangjeong village Mayor Kang Dong-kyun needs thousands with him when he delivers the petition to the IUCN Director General. Take one minute now and stand with him and the villagers fighting for the endangered species, coral reefs and their 400-year ecologically sustainable village! Petition: http://signon.org/sign/iucn-stop-environmental?source=s.icn.em.cr&r_by=417614&mailing_id=5784

(Christine Ahn's "Environmentalists Miss Chance to Protest Base" published at Foreign Policy in Focus in July provides background on this military land grab and environmental devastation at Jeju Island)

Renowned nuclear-free activist Arnie Gundersen speaks in Kyoto tonight

Arnie Gundersen will be speaking at Heartopia in Kyoto tomorrow night (Monday, September 3rd). See the full-sized pdf of the flyer above.
LESSONS FROM FUKUSHIMA
What all involved in nuclear power must learn from the Fukushima Daiichi accident.
Lecture and Q&A in English, with Japanese translation.
Arnie Gundersen has 40-years of nuclear power engineering experience. He attended Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) where he earned his Bachelor Degree cum laude while also becoming the recipient of a prestigious Atomic Energy Commission Fellowship for his Master Degree in nuclear engineering.
Arnie holds a nuclear safety patent, was a licensed reactor operator, and is a former nuclear industry senior vice president. During his nuclear power industry career, Arnie also managed and coordinated projects at 70-nuclear power plants in the US. Arnie is the chief engineer for Fairewinds Associates, Inc.
Date & Time: Monday September 3rd: 18:00~20:45 at Heartopia Kyoto
Entry: 500 yen (students: 300 yen)
Children under junior high age free
NO RESERVATIONS NECESSARY!
Directions: Heartopia is just a minute walk from Marutamachi Station on Subway Karasuma Line (which you can take from JR Kyoto Station). From Kyoto station the train will take approximately 7 minutes / is 4 stops. Just go out from Exit #5 of Marutamachi station, and you will be standing just below the building of Heartopia Kyoto. Take the Heartopia Kyoto elevator to the 3rd floor. Here is a map.

Deep Kyoto is a reliable source of important event (and dining!) information for those in the Kyoto area. Rather than reinvent the wheel, we are reposting DK's post on this critical event tonight. See you there!- Jen

Obon, Kyoto: "The Rafts of Spirits"

Beautiful video short from Studio Red Dot...

Naofumi Nakato: Hunger Strike Protest against V-22 "Osprey" aircraft in Ginowan City, Okinawa

(Photo: Naofumi Nakato)

Residents of Ginowan City, Okinawa are engaged in a hunger strike protest of the planned U.S. military deployment (low altitude testing and flight training) of V-22 "Osprey" aircraft.

They were recently joined by renowned Okinawan activist and Buddhist monk Shoichi Chibana, who traveled from his home in Yomitan to be with the elderly hunger strikers (who survived the Battle of Okinawa as children and have resisted the violence, noise, weapons testing, war training, environmental destruction, and toxic pollution of the U.S. military occupation for over six decades).

In an interview with Kyodo (published at The Japan Times) earlier this year, Chibana questioned the U.S. plan to station the test "Osprey" aircraft at the Futenma Marine Air Base in Ginowan City: "Why do they think Okinawans can accept what residents in Iwakuni and Shizuoka rejected?"

Jody Williams: "Demilitarization is not a dirty word"

Jody Williams' testimony on behalf of developing a global vision of  humane and environmental planetary security:

Demilitarization Is Not a Dirty Word

HUMAN SECURITY FOR GLOBAL SECURITY: Demilitarization is not a dirty word, nonviolence is not inaction, and building sustainable peace is not for the faint of heart

by Jody Williams, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate (1997)

The political, social and economic changes we all face are serious. Some might call the state of the world today chaos. The ongoing, dramatic changes in technology and communications are other elements adding to uncertainty and the feelings of insecurity that people around the globe are confronting. No one can predict the future but we can work hard to shape the outcomes.

Clearly there are huge obstacles to creating a world of sustainable peace with justice, equality and an end to impunity. A world free of militarism, armaments and the arms trade in which human and other resources are focused on meeting the needs of humanity rather than fueling conflicts and war. A world of sustainable development that nurtures our planet instead of continuing to devastate the environment and threaten life on earth. This will not happen over night. But worrying about the future is not a strategy for shaping it.

My own work, beginning with protests against the Vietnam War, has been against weapons, war and militarism. It is based on an understanding that sustainable peace is not simply the absence of armed conflict. The absence of armed conflict provides the bare minimum for the possibility of constructing sustainable peace based on socio-economic justice and equality. And to accomplish that we must change the understanding of security.

For centuries security has been defined as “national security” – which essentially has meant assuring the security of those in power and the apparatus of the state. Defending the state requires military power based on nationalism and patriotism. “Us” against “them.” How else could armies be formed that send other people’s children off to fight battles for resources, territory and to project the power of the state?

Now, with globalization where all aspects of life are increasingly and more rapidly interconnected around the world, it is time to move away from state-centric security to security based on the individual – “human security” not “national security.” The human security framework understands “security” as directing policies and resources toward meeting the basic needs of the majority of people on the planet: providing decent housing, education, access to medical care, employment with dignity, protection of civil and human rights and governments that respond to the needs of citizens. It means creating a world where people live with freedom from want and freedom from fear.

One part of being able to create that world is reclaiming and reasserting the meaning of “world peace.” It isn’t meditation, a rainbow with a dove flying over it, or singing peace songs. Nonviolence is not inaction and building sustainable peace must be understood as hard work every single day. We must all be active participants in change for the good. It doesn’t matter what issues people choose to work on – it could be global warming, an end to militarism, an end to poverty, or HIV/Aids for example.

What matters is that we all work on issues we feel passionate about and that our actions are for the benefit of everyone. By doing that our combined efforts enhance human security. We also must talk about our work in the context of human security so that people become familiar with the concept and understand the various elements that contribute to promoting and protecting human security.

Another aspect of creating a world based on human security not national security is to tackle demilitarization and the glorification of violence head on. It is an abomination that with the current global economic shake-down, countries still managed to find billions of dollars for weapons and the military while at the same time they are cutting funds for education, health care, job training, social services –the elements of daily life that are the basis of human security.

Demilitarization is not a dirty word. Civil society and national nongovernmental organization should confront demilitarization in our own countries. At the same time we must collectively press regional bodies such as the European Union, the African Union, the Organization of American States, and so on for global demilitarization. We also have another means of collective action, which is Article 26 of the UN Charter – not that we have illusions about the ability of the UN to seriously work for demilitarization. But every country that joins the UN commits to fulfilling the articles of the charter and Article 26 states:

In order to promote the establishment and maintenance of international peace and security with the least diversion for armaments of the world's human and economic resources, the Security Council shall be responsible for formulating…plans to be submitted to the members of the United Nations for the establishment of a system for the regulation of armaments.

In the more than six decades since the establishment of the UN, the Security Council has done absolutely nothing to fulfill its Article 26 obligation. But the member states of the UN have not done a thing to pressure the Security Council on Article 26 either.

Collectively, global civil society should begin actions to force the Security Council to “formulate plans” under Article 26 as soon as possible. Knowing that they will do everything in their formidable power to continue to ignore those obligations, global civil society should draw up its own plans and recommendations for demilitarization and how to use the resources resulting from demilitarization to enhance global human security. We can develop strategies and tactics around our plans and recommendations to pressure governments nationally, regionally and internationally to begin the process of demilitarization.

With demilitarization, the possibilities of positive change and human security in our world would be limitless. Humanity has the right to the real security of sustainable peace not the false “security” of militarism, armaments and war.

Nippon Myohoji: "Walk of Life" (命の行進 2012)

(空から一条の光が玄題旗に降り注ぎ、雲に、紫の帯になって、映っているようです！At the Kagoshima Prefecture Sendai nuclear power plant, before fasting, the priests engage in a prayer walk for purification from the sea. A streak of light from the sky fell on the flag from the sky, the clouds turned purple. Photo: Walk of Life on Facebook)

In early February, Nippon Myohoji Buddhist priests began a "Walk Of Life" across Japan, stopping at all the country's nuclear plants to offer prayers to the sacred grounds of each of these locations. Their final stop will be the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park on August 6.

This photo was taken in Kagoshima, at the southern tip of Kyushu.