日本必須整軍經武，但也必須服從美國的大戰略(四)
六
我們現在接著請台灣與台美鄉親們來讀三則報導，看看美國政府的反應、美國的東亞戰略[美國要在軍事上圍堵與壓制中國]以及美國政府如何告誡與勸說日本。
(1)“Abe’s Shrine Visit Drews U.S. Reproach”
Japan leader’s gambit threatens to upend U.S. priorities in Asia.
By George Nishiyama
Wall Street Journal
12/27/2013
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s surprise visit to a shrine linked to Japan’s militarist past THREATENS TO DAMAGE TIES WITH THE U.S. AND JEOPARDISE A PILLAR OF THE WHITE HOUSE’S DIPLOMATIC AND MILITARY STRATEGY IN ASIA.
The outing to Tokyo’s Yakusuni Shrine on Thursday triggered strong criticism from Beijing and Seoul, BUT ALSO a RARE ADMONITION FROM WASHINGTON.
“THE UNITED STATES IS DISAPPOINTED THAT JAPAN’S LEADERSHIP HAS TAKEN AN ACTION THAT WILL EXACERBATE TENSIONS WITH JAPAN’S NEIGHBORS,” said the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo on its website, IN AN UNUSUAL DIRECT CRITICISM OF JAPAN’S LEADER BY ITS MAIN ALLY.
The [Yakusuni] visit threatens to upend a vital Obama administration priority in Asia by inflaming South Korea, which was brutally colonized by Japan through World War Two. U.S. STRATEGY IN THE PACIFIC HINGES ON CHECKING CHINA’S RISING ECONOMIC AND MILITARY INFLUENCE BY TIGHTENING TIES BETWEEN TOKYO AND SEOUL, ---------
INSTEAD, MR. ABE’S VISIT TO THE SHRINE MARKED THE “FINAL BLOW TO ONGOING EFFORTS TO IMPROVE RELATIONS BETWEEN SOUTH KOREA AND JAPAN,” ---------
(2)“U.S. Seeks Assurance Abe Won’t Visit War Shrine Again”
By Yuka Hayashi
Wall Street Journal
1/25/2014
U.S. officials say THEY ARE SEEKING ASSURANCES FROM JAPAN THAT PRIME MINISTER SHINZO ABE WON’T REPEAT A VISIT TO A WAR SHRINE that angered China and South Korea and THEY WILL ASK MR. AVE TO REAFFIRM TOKYO’S PREVIOUS APOLOGIES OVER WORLD WAR II IN A BID TO EASE TENSIONS IN EAST ASIA.
U.S. officials said THEY WERE ASKING MR. ABE TO REFRAIN FROM THE TYPE OF COMMENTS AND ACTIONS THAT HAVE RUFFLED JAPAN’S NEIBHORS. The officials said THEY ARE CONVEYING THE REQUESTS PRIVATELY THROUGH DIPLOMATIC MEETINGS IN WASHINGTON AND TOKYO.
The officials said THEY WERE URGING JAPAN TO REACH OUT TO SOUTH KOREA TO END THEIR DISAGREEMENTS, WHICH ARE COMPLICATING EFFORTS TO WORK TOGETHER on broader regional issues. The officials say THEY ARE ALSO ASKING TOKYO TO ADDRESS DECADES-OLD DISAGREEMENTS OVER FORCED PROSTITUTION AT JAPANESE MILITARY BROTHELS IN WORLD WAR II.
(3)"Nationalistic Remarks From Japan Lead to Warnings of Chill With U.S."
By MARTIN FACKLER
New York Times
FEB. 19, 2014
TOKYO — A series of defiantly nationalistic comments, including remarks critical of the United States, by close political associates of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe HAS LED ANALYSTS TO WARN OF A GROWING CHILL BETWEEN HIS RIGHT-WING GOVERNMENT AND THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, WHICH VIEWS JAPAN AS A LINCHPIN OF ITS STRATEGIC PIVOT TO ASIA.
REBUTTALS FROM THE AMERICAN EMBASSY IN JAPAN HAVE ADDED TO CONCERNS OF A FALLING-OUT BETWEEN JAPAN AND THE UNITED STATES, WHICH SO FAR WELCOMED MR. ABE’S EFFORTS TO STRENGTHERN JAPAN’S ECONOMY AND MILITARY OUTREACH IN THE REGION TO SERVE AS A COUNTERBALANCE TO CHINA. The comments, which express revisionist views of Japan’s World War II history, have also led to renewed claims from Japan’s neighbors, particularly China and South Korea, that Mr. Abe is leading his nation to the right, trying to stir up patriotism and gloss over the country’s wartime history.
One of the most direct criticisms of the United States came this week, when Seiichi Eto, a governing party lawmaker and aide to Mr. Abe, posted a video online in which he criticized the Obama administration for expressing disappointment in the prime minister’s recent visit to a shrine. The visit to the shrine, which honors the war dead including war criminals, stoked anger in South Korea and China, which both suffered under Imperial Japanese rule.
“It is I who am disappointed in the United States,” said Mr. Eto in the video on YouTube, which was removed on Wednesday as the prime minister’s office sought to control the diplomatic damage. “Why doesn’t America treat Japan better?” he added.
The disconnect between Washington and its strongest Asian ally comes at a time of rising regional frictions that Mr. Abe has likened to Europe on the eve of World War I. THE DISPUTES OVER HISTORY AND TERRITORY HAVE COMPLICATED THE UNITED STATES’ ALREADY FRAUGHT ATTEMPTS TO PERSUDE JAPAN AND KOREA TO PRESENT A UNITED FRONT TO A MORE CONFIDENT CHINA, while also trying to avoid antagonizing the Chinese.
AMERICAN OFFICIALS EXPRESS FRUSTRATION THAT MR. ABE IS NOT DOING ENOUGH TO ALLAY FEARS IN SOUTH KOREA, A CRUCIAL AMERICAN ALLY IN ASIA, ABOUT A CONSERVATIVE AGENDA THEY WORRY INCLUDES ROLLING BACK THE APOLOGIES THAT JAPAN MADE FOR ITS EARLY 20TH-CENTURY EMPIRE-BUILDING. AMERICAN OFFICIALS ALSO FEAR HE COULD UNDERMINE HIS OWN EFFORTS TO RESTORE JAPAN’S STANDING IN ASIA BY PLAYING INTO WHAT THEY CALL CHINESE EFFORTS TO PAINT THE JAPANESE AS UNREPENTANT MILITARISTS.
ANALYSTS SAY SUCH CONCERNS ARE BEHIND THE UNITED STATES EMBASSY’S TAKING THE UNUSUAL STEP OF PUBLICLY CRITICIZING MR. ABE’S TRIP TO THE SHRINE.
For their part, Japanese officials express their own exasperation that the United States does not take a clearer stand in favor of Japan in its continuing dispute with China over the control of islands in the East China Sea. They also complain that the Obama administration has not rewarded Mr. Abe enough, despite his self-proclaimed efforts to improve ties with Washington by taking such politically difficult steps as pushing to restart a stalled base relocation in Okinawa.
“Prime Minister Abe feels frustrated,” said Yuichi Hosoya, an expert on United States-Japan relations at Keio University in Tokyo. “He feels he is not being thanked enough for expending his political capital to strengthen the alliance.”
One of the most provocative comments from Abe allies came this month, when an ultraconservative novelist, Naoki Hyakuta, who was appointed by the prime minister himself to the governing board of public broadcaster NHK, said in a speech that the Tokyo war tribunal after World War II was a means to cover up the “genocide” of American air raids on Tokyo and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The United States Embassy called the comments “preposterous.”
Mr. Hyakuta’s comments came days after the new president of NHK, who was chosen last month by a governing board including Abe appointees, raised eyebrows in Washington by saying that Japan should not be singled out for forcing women to provide sex to Japanese soldiers during the war, saying the United States military did the same. Most historians say the Japanese system of creating special brothels for the troops, then forcing tens of thousands of women from other countries to work there, was different from the practice by other countries’ troops in occupied areas who frequented local brothels.
The Japanese discontent with treatment by the Obama administration goes back to early last year, when a newly elected Mr. Abe tried to arrange an immediate trip to meet the president, only to be told to wait a month. More recently, Japanese officials have appeared hurt that Mr. Obama wants to spend only one night in Japan during a visit to the region in April.
Some analysts say this feeling of being held at arm’s length may be driving some of the recent criticisms of the United States.
“This is one of the most dangerous moments in U.S.-Japan relations that I have seen,” said Takashi Kawakami, an expert on international relations at Takushoku University in Tokyo. “Japan is feeling isolated, and some Japanese people are starting to think Japan must stand up for itself, including toward the United States.”
Analysts note that many of the comments are being made by relatively minor figures, and not members of Mr. Abe’s cabinet. They also say that Japanese public attitudes remain overwhelmingly favorable toward the United States, which has been the guarantor of Japan’s postwar security with its 50,000 military personnel stationed in the country.
At the same time, the analysts say, frustrations on both sides are real. In the United States, they reflect an ambivalence toward Mr. Abe, as some worry that he is returning to the agenda he pursued the last time he was prime minister — trying to revise the country’s pacifist Constitution and downplay wartime atrocities in the name of restoring lost national pride.
“I THINK THE YASUKUNI VISIT WAS A TURNING POINT IN U.S. ATTITUDES TOWARD ABE,” Daniel C. Sneider, associate director for research at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University, said of the visit to the shrine. “It was a reminder that he is still trying to push his patriotic remake of postwar Japan.”
The Yasukuni Shrine visit, and the American criticism of it, also appeared to unleash the current wave of revisionist statements.
American analysts and officials have faulted Mr. Abe for failing to sufficiently distance himself and his administration from the nationalistic statements. Instead, his government’s spokesman has merely said the statements represented the speakers’ “personal views” without criticizing them, though the spokesman did say the administration had asked Mr. Eto to remove the video expressing disappointment in the United States.
VISITING MEMBERS OF CONGRESS HAVE ALSO WARNED THAT REVISIONIST STATEMENTS AS WELL AS MR. ABE’S VISIT TO YASUKUNI WOULD ONLY BENEFIT CHINA. They added, however, that the American relationship with Japan is still sound enough to be easily fixable.
“There are always unfortunate statements and unfortunate comments even among the best of friends, and this is something that is going to have to be worked out and gotten over with,” said Representative Jim Sensenbrenner, Republican of Wisconsin, who was part of a group of visiting Congress members in Tokyo who met on Wednesday with Mr. Abe.
“IT IS IMPORTANT THAT WE HAVE AN ECONOMICALLY VIBRANT AND STRONG JAPAN TO ACT AS A COUNTERBALANCE TO CHINA.”
七
安倍政權看起來已有把華府的告誡與勸說當一回事的樣子。我們來讀英文日本時報與紐約時報的報導:---Read More---
“Abe: [Yohei] Kono Sex Slave Apology Stands”
Upholding 1993 statement seen as bid to ease tensions with South Korea
The Japan Times
Mar 14, 2014
Japan will not retract its 1993 apology for forcing women into sexual slavery in military brothels during the war, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Friday in an attempt to ease tensions with South Korea.
The confirmation by Abe followed similar remarks by some of his Cabinet members over the Kono statement that apologized over the wartime “comfort women,” who were mostly Koreans.
Vice Foreign Minister Akitaka Saiki visited Seoul earlier this week with the reported aim of conveying Tokyo’s position to the South Korean government.
“I’M NOT THINKING ABOUT REVISING (THE STATEMENT) UNDER MY CABINET,” Abe told a session of the Upper House Budget Committee. “MY HEART BREAKS WHEN I CONSIDER THE IMMEASURABLE PAIN” INFLICTED ON THOSE WOMEN.
The remarks can be seen as dismissing speculation that Japan may alter or water down the statement issued in 1993 by then-Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono.
Such speculation, and fierce criticism by South Korea, resulted from the Abe administration’s plan to scrutinize how the Kono statement was compiled, including “verifying” the testimony of 16 South Korean former comfort women that formed the basis for the apology.
The Kono statement acknowledged for the first time the involvement of the military and the use of coercion in recruiting females to provide sex for Japanese soldiers before and during World War II. But some conservative politicians have recently called for a rethink of the statement, claiming it was based on insufficient evidence.
Abe, whose perceived right-leaning policy has angered victims of Japan’s wartime militarism, particularly China and South Korea, also told the committee that HE STANDS BY JAPAN’S FORMAL APOLOGY ISSUED IN 1995 TO WARTIME VICTIMS.
“AS FOR MY OWN HISTORICAL VIEWS, I HAVE TAKEN THE POSITION HELD BY PREVIOUS CABINETS, “ he said, REFERRING TO THE 1995 STATEMENT BY PRIME MINISTER TOMIICHI MURAYAMA EXPRESSING JAPAN’S FEELINGS OF “DEEP REMORSE” AND “HEARTFELT APOLOGY,”
“Japan Stands by Apology to Its Wartime Sex Slaves”
By Martin Fackler
New York Times
3/15/2014
It was the first time since taking office more than a year ago that Mr. Abe has explicitly stated that his right-wing administration would uphold the official apology, known as the Kono Statement. That statement, issued by Yohei Kono, then the chief cabinet secretary, admitted that Japan’s military played at least an indirect role in forcing the so-called comfort women to provide sex to Japanese soldiers.
Mr. Abe’s previous appeals to end what he calls masochistic views of Japan’s history had raised concerns among South Korea and other former victims of Japanese aggression that his administration would seek to whitewash his nation’s wartime atrocities. Even before he took office, American officials warned Mr. Abe that any perceived historical revisionism could isolate Japan at a time when the United States needed its largest Asian ally to help face the challenge of a resurgent China.
台灣建州運動發起人周威霖
David C. Chou
Founder, Formosa Statehood Movement
(an organization devoted in current stage to making Taiwan a territorial commonwealth of the United States)
我們現在接著請台灣與台美鄉親們來讀三則報導，看看美國政府的反應、美國的東亞戰略[美國要在軍事上圍堵與壓制中國]以及美國政府如何告誡與勸說日本。
(1)“Abe’s Shrine Visit Drews U.S. Reproach”
Japan leader’s gambit threatens to upend U.S. priorities in Asia.
By George Nishiyama
Wall Street Journal
12/27/2013
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s surprise visit to a shrine linked to Japan’s militarist past THREATENS TO DAMAGE TIES WITH THE U.S. AND JEOPARDISE A PILLAR OF THE WHITE HOUSE’S DIPLOMATIC AND MILITARY STRATEGY IN ASIA.
The outing to Tokyo’s Yakusuni Shrine on Thursday triggered strong criticism from Beijing and Seoul, BUT ALSO a RARE ADMONITION FROM WASHINGTON.
“THE UNITED STATES IS DISAPPOINTED THAT JAPAN’S LEADERSHIP HAS TAKEN AN ACTION THAT WILL EXACERBATE TENSIONS WITH JAPAN’S NEIGHBORS,” said the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo on its website, IN AN UNUSUAL DIRECT CRITICISM OF JAPAN’S LEADER BY ITS MAIN ALLY.
The [Yakusuni] visit threatens to upend a vital Obama administration priority in Asia by inflaming South Korea, which was brutally colonized by Japan through World War Two. U.S. STRATEGY IN THE PACIFIC HINGES ON CHECKING CHINA’S RISING ECONOMIC AND MILITARY INFLUENCE BY TIGHTENING TIES BETWEEN TOKYO AND SEOUL, ---------
INSTEAD, MR. ABE’S VISIT TO THE SHRINE MARKED THE “FINAL BLOW TO ONGOING EFFORTS TO IMPROVE RELATIONS BETWEEN SOUTH KOREA AND JAPAN,” ---------
(2)“U.S. Seeks Assurance Abe Won’t Visit War Shrine Again”
By Yuka Hayashi
Wall Street Journal
1/25/2014
U.S. officials say THEY ARE SEEKING ASSURANCES FROM JAPAN THAT PRIME MINISTER SHINZO ABE WON’T REPEAT A VISIT TO A WAR SHRINE that angered China and South Korea and THEY WILL ASK MR. AVE TO REAFFIRM TOKYO’S PREVIOUS APOLOGIES OVER WORLD WAR II IN A BID TO EASE TENSIONS IN EAST ASIA.
U.S. officials said THEY WERE ASKING MR. ABE TO REFRAIN FROM THE TYPE OF COMMENTS AND ACTIONS THAT HAVE RUFFLED JAPAN’S NEIBHORS. The officials said THEY ARE CONVEYING THE REQUESTS PRIVATELY THROUGH DIPLOMATIC MEETINGS IN WASHINGTON AND TOKYO.
The officials said THEY WERE URGING JAPAN TO REACH OUT TO SOUTH KOREA TO END THEIR DISAGREEMENTS, WHICH ARE COMPLICATING EFFORTS TO WORK TOGETHER on broader regional issues. The officials say THEY ARE ALSO ASKING TOKYO TO ADDRESS DECADES-OLD DISAGREEMENTS OVER FORCED PROSTITUTION AT JAPANESE MILITARY BROTHELS IN WORLD WAR II.
(3)"Nationalistic Remarks From Japan Lead to Warnings of Chill With U.S."
By MARTIN FACKLER
New York Times
FEB. 19, 2014
TOKYO — A series of defiantly nationalistic comments, including remarks critical of the United States, by close political associates of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe HAS LED ANALYSTS TO WARN OF A GROWING CHILL BETWEEN HIS RIGHT-WING GOVERNMENT AND THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, WHICH VIEWS JAPAN AS A LINCHPIN OF ITS STRATEGIC PIVOT TO ASIA.
REBUTTALS FROM THE AMERICAN EMBASSY IN JAPAN HAVE ADDED TO CONCERNS OF A FALLING-OUT BETWEEN JAPAN AND THE UNITED STATES, WHICH SO FAR WELCOMED MR. ABE’S EFFORTS TO STRENGTHERN JAPAN’S ECONOMY AND MILITARY OUTREACH IN THE REGION TO SERVE AS A COUNTERBALANCE TO CHINA. The comments, which express revisionist views of Japan’s World War II history, have also led to renewed claims from Japan’s neighbors, particularly China and South Korea, that Mr. Abe is leading his nation to the right, trying to stir up patriotism and gloss over the country’s wartime history.
One of the most direct criticisms of the United States came this week, when Seiichi Eto, a governing party lawmaker and aide to Mr. Abe, posted a video online in which he criticized the Obama administration for expressing disappointment in the prime minister’s recent visit to a shrine. The visit to the shrine, which honors the war dead including war criminals, stoked anger in South Korea and China, which both suffered under Imperial Japanese rule.
“It is I who am disappointed in the United States,” said Mr. Eto in the video on YouTube, which was removed on Wednesday as the prime minister’s office sought to control the diplomatic damage. “Why doesn’t America treat Japan better?” he added.
The disconnect between Washington and its strongest Asian ally comes at a time of rising regional frictions that Mr. Abe has likened to Europe on the eve of World War I. THE DISPUTES OVER HISTORY AND TERRITORY HAVE COMPLICATED THE UNITED STATES’ ALREADY FRAUGHT ATTEMPTS TO PERSUDE JAPAN AND KOREA TO PRESENT A UNITED FRONT TO A MORE CONFIDENT CHINA, while also trying to avoid antagonizing the Chinese.
AMERICAN OFFICIALS EXPRESS FRUSTRATION THAT MR. ABE IS NOT DOING ENOUGH TO ALLAY FEARS IN SOUTH KOREA, A CRUCIAL AMERICAN ALLY IN ASIA, ABOUT A CONSERVATIVE AGENDA THEY WORRY INCLUDES ROLLING BACK THE APOLOGIES THAT JAPAN MADE FOR ITS EARLY 20TH-CENTURY EMPIRE-BUILDING. AMERICAN OFFICIALS ALSO FEAR HE COULD UNDERMINE HIS OWN EFFORTS TO RESTORE JAPAN’S STANDING IN ASIA BY PLAYING INTO WHAT THEY CALL CHINESE EFFORTS TO PAINT THE JAPANESE AS UNREPENTANT MILITARISTS.
ANALYSTS SAY SUCH CONCERNS ARE BEHIND THE UNITED STATES EMBASSY’S TAKING THE UNUSUAL STEP OF PUBLICLY CRITICIZING MR. ABE’S TRIP TO THE SHRINE.
For their part, Japanese officials express their own exasperation that the United States does not take a clearer stand in favor of Japan in its continuing dispute with China over the control of islands in the East China Sea. They also complain that the Obama administration has not rewarded Mr. Abe enough, despite his self-proclaimed efforts to improve ties with Washington by taking such politically difficult steps as pushing to restart a stalled base relocation in Okinawa.
“Prime Minister Abe feels frustrated,” said Yuichi Hosoya, an expert on United States-Japan relations at Keio University in Tokyo. “He feels he is not being thanked enough for expending his political capital to strengthen the alliance.”
One of the most provocative comments from Abe allies came this month, when an ultraconservative novelist, Naoki Hyakuta, who was appointed by the prime minister himself to the governing board of public broadcaster NHK, said in a speech that the Tokyo war tribunal after World War II was a means to cover up the “genocide” of American air raids on Tokyo and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The United States Embassy called the comments “preposterous.”
Mr. Hyakuta’s comments came days after the new president of NHK, who was chosen last month by a governing board including Abe appointees, raised eyebrows in Washington by saying that Japan should not be singled out for forcing women to provide sex to Japanese soldiers during the war, saying the United States military did the same. Most historians say the Japanese system of creating special brothels for the troops, then forcing tens of thousands of women from other countries to work there, was different from the practice by other countries’ troops in occupied areas who frequented local brothels.
The Japanese discontent with treatment by the Obama administration goes back to early last year, when a newly elected Mr. Abe tried to arrange an immediate trip to meet the president, only to be told to wait a month. More recently, Japanese officials have appeared hurt that Mr. Obama wants to spend only one night in Japan during a visit to the region in April.
Some analysts say this feeling of being held at arm’s length may be driving some of the recent criticisms of the United States.
“This is one of the most dangerous moments in U.S.-Japan relations that I have seen,” said Takashi Kawakami, an expert on international relations at Takushoku University in Tokyo. “Japan is feeling isolated, and some Japanese people are starting to think Japan must stand up for itself, including toward the United States.”
Analysts note that many of the comments are being made by relatively minor figures, and not members of Mr. Abe’s cabinet. They also say that Japanese public attitudes remain overwhelmingly favorable toward the United States, which has been the guarantor of Japan’s postwar security with its 50,000 military personnel stationed in the country.
At the same time, the analysts say, frustrations on both sides are real. In the United States, they reflect an ambivalence toward Mr. Abe, as some worry that he is returning to the agenda he pursued the last time he was prime minister — trying to revise the country’s pacifist Constitution and downplay wartime atrocities in the name of restoring lost national pride.
“I THINK THE YASUKUNI VISIT WAS A TURNING POINT IN U.S. ATTITUDES TOWARD ABE,” Daniel C. Sneider, associate director for research at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University, said of the visit to the shrine. “It was a reminder that he is still trying to push his patriotic remake of postwar Japan.”
The Yasukuni Shrine visit, and the American criticism of it, also appeared to unleash the current wave of revisionist statements.
American analysts and officials have faulted Mr. Abe for failing to sufficiently distance himself and his administration from the nationalistic statements. Instead, his government’s spokesman has merely said the statements represented the speakers’ “personal views” without criticizing them, though the spokesman did say the administration had asked Mr. Eto to remove the video expressing disappointment in the United States.
VISITING MEMBERS OF CONGRESS HAVE ALSO WARNED THAT REVISIONIST STATEMENTS AS WELL AS MR. ABE’S VISIT TO YASUKUNI WOULD ONLY BENEFIT CHINA. They added, however, that the American relationship with Japan is still sound enough to be easily fixable.
“There are always unfortunate statements and unfortunate comments even among the best of friends, and this is something that is going to have to be worked out and gotten over with,” said Representative Jim Sensenbrenner, Republican of Wisconsin, who was part of a group of visiting Congress members in Tokyo who met on Wednesday with Mr. Abe.
“IT IS IMPORTANT THAT WE HAVE AN ECONOMICALLY VIBRANT AND STRONG JAPAN TO ACT AS A COUNTERBALANCE TO CHINA.”
七
安倍政權看起來已有把華府的告誡與勸說當一回事的樣子。我們來讀英文日本時報與紐約時報的報導:
“Abe: [Yohei] Kono Sex Slave Apology Stands”
Upholding 1993 statement seen as bid to ease tensions with South Korea
The Japan Times
Mar 14, 2014
Japan will not retract its 1993 apology for forcing women into sexual slavery in military brothels during the war, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Friday in an attempt to ease tensions with South Korea.
The confirmation by Abe followed similar remarks by some of his Cabinet members over the Kono statement that apologized over the wartime “comfort women,” who were mostly Koreans.
Vice Foreign Minister Akitaka Saiki visited Seoul earlier this week with the reported aim of conveying Tokyo’s position to the South Korean government.
“I’M NOT THINKING ABOUT REVISING (THE STATEMENT) UNDER MY CABINET,” Abe told a session of the Upper House Budget Committee. “MY HEART BREAKS WHEN I CONSIDER THE IMMEASURABLE PAIN” INFLICTED ON THOSE WOMEN.
The remarks can be seen as dismissing speculation that Japan may alter or water down the statement issued in 1993 by then-Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono.
Such speculation, and fierce criticism by South Korea, resulted from the Abe administration’s plan to scrutinize how the Kono statement was compiled, including “verifying” the testimony of 16 South Korean former comfort women that formed the basis for the apology.
The Kono statement acknowledged for the first time the involvement of the military and the use of coercion in recruiting females to provide sex for Japanese soldiers before and during World War II. But some conservative politicians have recently called for a rethink of the statement, claiming it was based on insufficient evidence.
Abe, whose perceived right-leaning policy has angered victims of Japan’s wartime militarism, particularly China and South Korea, also told the committee that HE STANDS BY JAPAN’S FORMAL APOLOGY ISSUED IN 1995 TO WARTIME VICTIMS.
“AS FOR MY OWN HISTORICAL VIEWS, I HAVE TAKEN THE POSITION HELD BY PREVIOUS CABINETS, “ he said, REFERRING TO THE 1995 STATEMENT BY PRIME MINISTER TOMIICHI MURAYAMA EXPRESSING JAPAN’S FEELINGS OF “DEEP REMORSE” AND “HEARTFELT APOLOGY,”
“Japan Stands by Apology to Its Wartime Sex Slaves”
By Martin Fackler
New York Times
3/15/2014
It was the first time since taking office more than a year ago that Mr. Abe has explicitly stated that his right-wing administration would uphold the official apology, known as the Kono Statement. That statement, issued by Yohei Kono, then the chief cabinet secretary, admitted that Japan’s military played at least an indirect role in forcing the so-called comfort women to provide sex to Japanese soldiers.
Mr. Abe’s previous appeals to end what he calls masochistic views of Japan’s history had raised concerns among South Korea and other former victims of Japanese aggression that his administration would seek to whitewash his nation’s wartime atrocities. Even before he took office, American officials warned Mr. Abe that any perceived historical revisionism could isolate Japan at a time when the United States needed its largest Asian ally to help face the challenge of a resurgent China.
台灣建州運動發起人周威霖
David C. Chou
Founder, Formosa Statehood Movement
(an organization devoted in current stage to making Taiwan a territorial commonwealth of the United States)
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