[Editorial] Abe may have changed his wording, but his attitude is still the same

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe

During a recent interview with the Washington Post, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said that the comfort women, sex slaves for the Japanese imperial army, had been “victimized by human trafficking.” This is the first time that Abe has used the expression “human trafficking” in regard to the issue of the comfort women. It is clear that his choice of expressions was based on a number of calculations, including the speech he will deliver before a joint session of the US Congress on Apr. 26.

The expression “human trafficking” generally refers to the act of buying and selling women or young people through various coercive means with the goal of sexual exploitation or forced labor.

Considering that, prior to this, the Abe administration had not acknowledged the coercive nature of the recruitment of the comfort women, the use of the expression “human trafficking” could be seen as some degree of progress.

But when we strip away the rhetoric, it becomes clear that the remark is a clever semantic ruse that dodges the heart of the comfort women issue.

Most importantly, Abe’s remark omits the agent of the human trafficking. The crux of the comfort women issue is for Japan to acknowledge that its army was directly involved, from their recruitment of the women to the installation, operation, and management of the comfort stations.

Even as Abe spoke of the injustice of these criminal actions, in the end he omitted the most crucial detail: who committed those criminal acts. In fact, the remark insinuates that private business operators were the only ones responsible for trafficking the comfort women and that the Japanese army was uninvolved.

Abe’s comment that his “heart aches” when he thinks about how the comfort women went “through immeasurable pain and suffering beyond description” should be understood in the same light. Rather than the apology and remorse that a perpetrator ought to show, Abe’s “heart ache” is merely an expression of personal sympathy from the perspective of a bystander.

Abe’s attempt to downplay the issue was also evident when he said, “Hitherto in history, many wars have been waged. In this context, women‘s human rights were violated.” While Abe is acknowledging the suffering of the comfort women, this comment strongly suggests that their suffering was not the result of specific acts carried out by the Japanese army but was instead a general tragedy that always happens during wartime.

Before his address to US Congress, Abe meticulously chose expressions aimed at emphasizing that the comfort women issue violated universal human values - to deflect the criticism of the international community - while at the same time adroitly sidestepping Japan’s culpability for that issue.

After the announcement that Abe would be speaking to the US Congress, South Korean diplomats were unable to hide their dismay but also promised to work hard to ensure that Japan would adopt a proper attitude about historical issues. But given Abe’s comments, these expectations appear hopeless.

Nothing has changed about Abe’s attitude toward the comfort women. If anything, it could even give American society, which lacks a deep understanding of the comfort women issue, the impression that Japan has apologized and is sufficiently contrite for the problems of the past.

It is hard not to feel that, as Abe keeps making clever moves to create sympathy in the international community about historical issues, South Korea’s diplomats stand by helplessly and continue to be blindsided by these moves.

　

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