‘Geunrojeongsindae Lawsuit’ Grandmother Kim Seong-ju Passes Away at Age 95

Anyang Funeral Hall for the Wake... Farewell Ceremony on the 7th at 1 PM

Grandmother Kim Seong-ju.

Kim Seong-ju, a victim of forced mobilization as a Mitsubishi female labor conscript, passed away on the 5th at the age of 95.

The Citizens' Group for Forced Mobilization under Japanese Rule announced on the 6th through a press release that Grandma Kim passed away due to old age at her home in Anyang, Gyeonggi Province the previous afternoon.

Grandma Kim, originally from Suncheon, Jeollanam-do, was forcibly mobilized to the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Nagoya Aircraft Manufacturing Plant in Japan around May 1944, when she was 14 years old, deceived by a Japanese teacher who said, "If you go to Japan, you can earn money and study to attend middle school."

While being forced to work without pay, she worked on a lathe cutting steel plates and lost her left index finger. On December 7, 1944, during the Southeast Sea earthquake, she was trapped under collapsing building debris and severely injured her ankle.

After liberation, she returned to her hometown but endured all kinds of insults and mistreatment. Grandma Kim once said during her lifetime, "I never walked proudly on the main road in my life, always living on the backstreets."

Later, gathering courage, she joined lawsuits in Japan with Grandma Yang Geum-deok and others, but in November 2008, the Japanese Supreme Court ultimately dismissed the case. In 2009, the Japanese government drew criticism for belatedly paying 99 yen to Grandma Kim and other plaintiffs in the Japanese lawsuit under the name of welfare pension withdrawal allowance.

With the help of the citizens' group, she filed a damages lawsuit against Mitsubishi Heavy Industries at the Gwangju District Court in October 2012, and after more than six years, on November 29, 2018, she finally won the case at the Supreme Court.

She is survived by two sons and two daughters, and the funeral is being held at Anyang Funeral Hall. The funeral procession will be at 1 p.m. on the 7th.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.