Fresh evidence of Japan’s colonial-era atrocities was revealed by Korean media outlets on Sunday, escalating growing pressure on Tokyo to confront history and sincerely apologize for its past wrongdoing.
A document, which was recently found in a Korean-American church in Manhattan, New York, revealed that Japanese police sexually tortured young Korean women after the March 1 independence movement in 1919.
“Among the tortures and brutalities dwelt on by writers and especially emphasized by the American press were those dealing with young women and school girls who were stripped, examined, tortured and maltreated,” reads the document, entitled “The Korean Situation.”
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Copies of the document found in a U.S. church presumed to have been written in 1920. (Yonhap) |
The 27-page document explained the pan-peninsular independence campaign that was launched on March 1, 1919. Influenced by then-U.S. President Woodrow Wilson’s 1918 speech that underscored the right of national self-determination, the campaign brought Koreans together in a struggle against Japanese imperialism.
The document is thought to have been written in June 1920 by the Commission on Relations with the Orient under the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.
The document depicted the Japanese police crackdown on Korean independent fighters in detail.
Police, gendarmes and soldiers were mobilized to “prevent and suppress” demonstrations, and their crackdowns led to procedures and practices that were condemned “not only in other lands but by many enlightened Japanese,” the document reads.
“No charge was made of rape under these conditions,” the document added. The document suggested this may have been due to women being unable to press for rape charges, despite it occurring.
The document stated that U.S. missionaries made an inquiry to the Japanese police about how many were sexually tortured, and the reply was that “no statistics are available.”
The revelation of the document is expected to add to the increasing pressure on Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to confront history and make a sincere apology for Japan’s past atrocities, including the sexual enslavement of Korean women at military brothels during World War II.
Abe is slated to deliver a speech at a joint session of the U.S. Congress on Wednesday. Observers expect the prime minister may express a sense of remorse over Japan’s past militarism, but fall short of making an unequivocal apology that Seoul, Beijing and other nations have long called for.
By Song Sang-ho (
sshluck@heraldcorp.com)
