Japanese Civic Group: "Government's Denial of 'Forced Labor' Is Domestic Propaganda... Not Accepted Internationally"

ILO "Japan Takes No Measures to Resolve Comfort Women and Forced Labor Victims Issues"
Joint Action "Must Make Every Effort to Reconcile with Victims"

A Japanese civic group argued that the Japanese government's claim denying the forced labor of Koreans during the Japanese colonial period is not internationally accepted, based on the annual report of the International Labour Organization (ILO) Committee of Experts.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

On the 12th, the coalition of Japanese civic groups called "Joint Action for Resolving Forced Mobilization Issues and Past Clearance" (Joint Action) held a press conference at the meeting room of the 2nd Members' Office Building of the Japanese House of Representatives, explaining the annual report of the "Committee of Experts on the Application of Conventions and Recommendations" (CEACR) published in February.

The annual report of the ILO Committee of Experts pointed out that the Japanese government has not taken concrete measures to resolve the issues of comfort women and forced labor victims since 2018. It also emphasized that considering the seriousness of the matter, all efforts must be made to reconcile with the increasingly aging surviving victims. Based on this, the civic group Joint Action urged, "Make a conclusion on the victims' demands without delay and respond in a way that meets their expectations."

Joint Action also criticized, "The Japanese government decided in 2021 that labor recruitment or conscription does not constitute forced labor under the ILO conventions," adding, "This denial of 'forced labor' by the Japanese government is not only internationally unacceptable according to this report but also revealed to be nothing more than domestic propaganda and agitation."

Joint Action criticized that the Japanese government's denial of forced labor led to the destruction of the Korean laborers' memorial monument dismantled in Gunma Prefecture and significantly influenced the judgments of the Japanese judiciary. The memorial for Korean laborers was installed in 2004 by local residents to inform future generations about the forced mobilization of Koreans during the Japanese colonial period and to promote goodwill between both sides.

However, in 2012, far-right groups raised objections demanding its removal, citing that an event participant mentioned "forced abduction." The Gunma Prefectural authorities, who sympathized with this, refused to renew the installation permit, and after litigation with civic groups, the Japanese Supreme Court ruled in 2022 that the local government's disposition was lawful.

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