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WWII Sex Slaves File Class Action Suit Against Japan
Fifteen former "comfort women" who survived Japanese sex slave camps during World War II filed a historic class action lawsuit on Monday against the Japanese government.
Attorney Michael Hausfeld, one of the lawyers for the plaintiffs, told a crowded press conference here that the Japanese,like their German racist colleagues, also pursued racist policies and treated women from countries occupied or colonized by Japan in the most demeaning manner.
"We're not looking at these offenses because they are just single instances of rape. We're looking at them because they involve massive, systematic, premeditated forced rape," he said.
During the press conference, two former "comfort women," one from South Korea and another from Taiwan of China, told their chilling stories during World War II when they were cheated and forced to serve as sex slaves for Japanese soldiers.
The lawsuit was filed under the Alien Tort Claims Act, an 18th century U.S. law which grants foreign citizens the right to sue for abuses of international law in U.S. courts.
The suit, filed in the District Court for the District of Colombia on behalf all women who were forced into sexual slavery by Japan between 1931 and 1945 as well as their heirs, accuses Japan of instituting sexual slavery on a massive scale.
It alleges that the "comfort women" program was a systematic plan ordered and executed by the Japanese government because it required the deployment of the vast infrastructure and resources that were at the government's disposal, including soldiers and support personnel, weapons, all forms of land and sea transportation, and engineering and construction crews and materiel.
According to the lawsuit, the Japanese government built, operated, and controlled hundreds of "comfort stations" staffed with hundreds of thousands of women and girls, who were taken by Japan from countries throughout its enormous area of colonization and occupation and placed in slavery for the purpose of providing sexual pleasure to the Japanese military.
The press conference was followed by a silent vigil conducted by the 15 plaintiffs in front of the Japanese embassy in Washington.
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