タイトル： Bergen County to honor WWII ‘comfort women’ for suffering at hands of Japanese
THURSDAY, MARCH 7, 2013 LAST UPDATED: FRIDAY MARCH 8, 2013, 6:42 AM
BY MONSY ALVARADO
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【 記事日本語要約 】※正確な内容は原文をご覧ください。
タイトル：日本人によって苦しめられる戦時中慰安婦をバーゲン郡が称える
2013年3月7日 MONSY ALVARADO 記者
一部の日本人から批判が続く中、バーゲン郡は金曜（3月8日）、戦時中に日本軍によって性奴隷とされた女性達の記念碑を称えようとしている。
このところ、郡議員のもとに日本占領地域の女性は軍の奴隷ではなく商業売春婦であったと論ずるメールが届いている。海外在住日本人からのメールには、戦時中売春婦は拉致された女性達という話は作り話だと主張が書かれている。
慰安婦と呼ばれる人たちが、奴隷か売春婦かは、長年の論争となっている。慰安婦記念碑が米国で最初に出来たニュージャージ州でも、この国際論争が起こっている。最初の記念碑は2010年にパラセイドパークに建てられ、二つ目は昨年ニューヨーク州ウエストバリーに、今後はミシガン州やテキサス州で検討されている。
ニュージャージ州、ニューヨーク州の記念碑に対し、日本の右翼活動家やその支持者から反対が起こっている。昨年は日本の国会議員がパリセイドパークを訪問し、歴史的に正しくない内容であることを理由に碑撤去を求めた。
その後、オバマ政権に記念碑撤去の請願が出され、2万5千以上の署名を集めている。
あるメールには、「戦後約50年たってから、”戦時中に多くの女性が日本軍に拉致され、売春婦にさせられた”というあり得ない話が日韓に持ち上がった」と書かれている。
バーゲン郡関係者は、抗議の手紙の影響でハッケンサックの記念碑計画が変更することはないと述べていた。記念碑はハッケンサックの郡裁判所前の名誉の輪（the Ring of Honor ）の記念碑の一つに加えられる。韓国系コミュニティーによって寄付が集められ、3月8日の国際女性の日に公開される。
「戦時中に女性が残忍な扱いを受けたのは事実」と郡議員John D. Mitchell氏は述べる。彼の元にも抗議のメールが届いているが、「数の問題はあるにしろ、女性が残忍な扱いを受けた事実は事実。」と語る。
一方、今週、ニューヨーク日本総領事館は、日本政府は過去に謝罪し、元慰安婦への償い金を支給する女性基金も設立、今後も女性への暴力を防止する為に努力していく、と繰り返し述べている。
また、領事館は、12月に政権を取った日本の安倍首相は、日本はアジア諸国の人々に多大な危害を与えたことを過去に認めているとしている。
あるページには「歴代の首相同様、安倍首相は慰安婦の辛い経験を思い深く心を痛めている」、「安倍首相の説明のように安倍政権の立場は慰安婦問題を政治、外交問題とすべきではない」と書かれている。
慰安婦を研究した Asia Policy Point のMindy Kotler氏は、安倍首相は前政権の2006～2007年当時、93年河野談話による謝罪を批判したが、最近の安倍首相の発言は真の謝罪ではなく単なる美辞麗句である、とし、「言葉の上で安倍首相はこの問題から距離を置いており、慰安婦関係の質問は官房長官に任せている」が「官房長官は首相ではない」と語っている。
バーゲン郡の記念碑は「第二次大戦中、日本帝国軍によって性奴隷に強要された韓国、中国、台湾、フィリピン、オランダ、インドネシア、他日本占領地域の何十万もの女性・少女」の名誉の為に、と刻まれている。
「これは日本政府とは関係の無いことで、女性の名誉の為です。」 Kathleen Donovanバーゲン郡長事務所の Jeanne Baratta氏は強調する。
Baratta氏によると郡長事務所に Japanese Women for Justice and Peaceと称するところから強制連行・性奴隷は嘘であると説明する雑誌が送られて来たとのこと。
（補足：なでしこアクションで作成・製本して送った冊子）
「郡長はそれでも怯むことなく、慰安婦を心に留め、過去に起こったことを忘れません。」
Kotler氏にもメール来ているが、「豊富に資金援助を受けた日本の右翼グループ」からのメールであるとし、彼らは、まともな歴史家なら目を回して首を横に振るような歴史を真面に信じている人たち、であると語る。
「なでしこアクション」（Japanese Women for Justice and Peace）のまとめ役の一人である東京在住の山本優美子がメールで答えたところによると、なでしこアクションは慰安婦問題に関心のある日本女性の草の根の集まりで、政治的な組織には属しておらず、この数週間で議員や新聞社にメールを送ったとしている。
山本はまた、慰安婦記念碑の文言は事実ではなく、我が国と先人への侮辱であり名誉を汚すものであると述べている。
フォートリーのニュージャージ日米協会代表のヨシガキ ミナは、この問題は敏感な問題であり、両国政府が解決すべきものであるとしている。また、バーゲン郡の日本人と韓国人は仲良く暮らしており、慰安婦問題は米国内で政治化すべきでないと語る。「記念碑は教育目的であるなら結構です。米国人を憎むためでなく、犠牲者を忘れないために同様な記念碑が広島や長崎にもあります。」
約50世帯が登録するTenafly 日本人協会の代表フジイ カレンによると慰安婦問題は話題になったことはなく、記念碑計画も知らなかったとのこと。
「過去に起こったことには敬意をはらいますし、今変更することはできません。現在前向きに生活することに最善をつくします。日本人コミュニティーもこの問題は知っているとは思いますが、普段話題になることはありません。」
Email: alvarado@northjersey.com
【 記事原文 】
Bergen County to honor WWII ‘comfort women’ for suffering at hands of Japanese
THURSDAY, MARCH 7, 2013 LAST UPDATED: FRIDAY MARCH 8, 2013, 12:35 PM
STAFF WRITER
THE RECORD
Bergen County will dedicate a stone Friday to women sexually enslaved by the Japanese armed forces during World War II as some Japanese continue to insist that the historical portrayal is inaccurate and criticize similar memorials elsewhere.
In recent days, the Bergen County Freeholders have received emails arguing that the women in Japanese-occupied territories were not enslaved by the military, but instead, were paid prostitutes. The electronic missives from Japanese living abroad maintain that stories of women being abducted and forced by the military to work in brothels during the war are fabrications.
Whether the so-called comfort women were enslaved or prostitutes has been disputed for years. The international controversy has played out in New Jersey, the first state in the United States to have a monument honoring the women. The stone in Palisades Park was dedicated in 2010, followed by a second in Westbury, N.Y., last year, and others are being discussed in Michigan and Texas.
The New Jersey and New York stones have spurred “right-wing” Japanese activists and their supporters to object to their existence. Last year, members of the Japanese Parliament visited Palisades Park, and asked town officials there to remove the stone because they said it contained “historical inaccuracies.”
Weeks later, a petition asking the Obama administration to remove the monument in New Jersey got more than 25,000 signatures on the We The People website.
“As many as 50 years after the war, a bogus story was suddenly spread in Korea and Japan, a story that Japanese military abducted many women and forced into prostitution during the War,’’ reads one email.
But Bergen County officials said the letters have not deterred them from their plans to dedicate the stone in Hackensack, where it will join other memorials in the Ring of Honor in front of the Bergen County Courthouse. The memorial, paid for with donations collected by the Korean community, will be unveiled on International Women’s Day.
“The fact is these women were brutalized during World War II,” said Freeholder John D. Mitchell, who said he’s received a handful of similar emails. “We can argue over the numbers so on and so forth, but the fact remains that one woman brutalized is one too many.”
Meanwhile, the Office of the Consulate General of Japan in New York reiterated this week that the Japanese government has apologized for its actions in the past, that it set up a women’s fund that distributed money to benefit former comfort women and that it will work toward preventing future violations against women.
It also said that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who took office in December, acknowledges that in the past, Japan caused tremendous damage and suffering to the people of many countries, particularly those in Asian nations.
“Prime Minister Abe is deeply pained when thinking of the comfort women who experienced immeasurable pain and suffering, a feeling shared by his predecessors,” reads the one-page statement. “As explained by Prime Minister Abe, the position of the Abe Cabinet regarding the comfort women issue is that it should not be politicized or turned into a diplomatic matter.”
Mindy Kotler, director of Asia Policy Point who has done research on the comfort women, said that when Abe was prime minister in 2006 to 2007, he criticized the apology to the comfort women made in 1993 by Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono. She said Abe’s recent statements are not a true apology, just a compilation of past rhetoric made by Japanese officials.
“Linguistically, he distanced himself from the issue, and he has now referred all questions regarding comfort women to his chief Cabinet secretary,” she said. “That’s sort of the chief spokesman or governmental spokesman, but that person is not the prime minister.”
The Bergen County stone will bear an inscription that will honor “hundreds of thousands of women and girls from Korea, China, Taiwan, the Philippines, the Netherlands, Indonesia and other Japanese-occupied territories who were forced into sexual slavery by the Imperial Armed Forces of Japan before and during World War II.”
“This has nothing to do with the Japanese government,” stressed Jeanne Baratta, chief of staff for Bergen County Executive Kathleen Donovan. “It’s more to honor those women.”
Baratta said the county executive’s office received a “glossy magazine” a while ago from an organization calling itself Japanese Women for Justice and Peace, who said the stories of abductions and forced sexual slavery were lies.
“The county executive is not shying away from it though, it’s to remember these women, so we don’t forget what happened,” she said.
Kotler said the emails, which she has also received, are from what she called a “well-financed right-wing group” in Japan.
“They are true believers of this perception of this history, a history that legitimate historians would roll their eyes and shake their heads,” she said.
Yumiko Yamamoto, who lives in Tokyo, wrote via email that she is among the organizers of Japanese Women for Justice and Peace, also known as “Nadesiko Action,” which she described as a grassroots gathering of Japanese women who are concerned about the comfort women issue. She said they do not belong to any political organizations, and that she is among those who have written emails to elected officials and newspapers in recent weeks.
Yamamoto said the claims that are inscribed in the monuments are not facts.
“This is a humiliation and dishonor of our country and ancestry,” she wrote.
Mina Yoshigaki, president of the Japanese-American Society of New Jersey in Fort Lee, called the issue a “sensitive one,” but one that should be left to the governments of each nation to resolve. She said Japanese and Koreans living in Bergen County get along, and that the comfort women issue should not be politicized in the United States.
“That statue, they say it’s educational, for educational purposes, and that’s fine,” she said. “Japanese people have put monuments in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, just like that. Not to hate American people, but to remember victims.”
Karen Fujii, chairwomen of the Tenafly Japanese Community Association, whose membership counts about 50 families in the borough, said the comfort women controversy has never been discussed at any gatherings she’s attended. Fujii acknowledged that she didn’t know that the county was planning to erect a memorial.
Personally, she said, she doesn’t object to the stone, although she said it’s not a “proud moment” for the Japanese.
“I try to respect what happened in the past, and we can’t change it now, so we do the best we can to live positively,” she said. “I think the Japanese community here is aware of the issue, but it’s not something that is up for discussion on a regular basis.”
Email: alvarado@northjersey.com