SKYMUN VIII Chair Report
Forum: Six-Party Talks Issue: Measures to Resolve Historical Conflict Regarding Victims of WWII while Preventing the Misuse of Funds by Government Officials Student Officer: Katie Yoo, Deputy Assistant President
1. Introduction
Due to the Second World War (1939 to 1945), proper measures to resolve historical conflict regarding millions of victims around the world remain neglected for decades. For about 50 years, the WWII victims of forced labor and sex slaves have kept silent, fearing the social stigma that will lie upon them. Prior to 1945, Korea, spending over six years under the Japanese colony, is known to be one of the major victims of both. However, from the late 20th century, countries like Korea and China have been calling for a re-evaluation of compensation for victims who are still physically and mentally suffering from the consequences of war. Although Japan, along with the nations, tried to reach an agreeable point, most failed and did not meet the demands of the victims. This topic is especially pertinent to Six-Party Talks as Japan, the two Koreas, China are all directly affected and involved in this conflict. The delegates must craft a resolution that reaches a compromise that considers the opposing stances of each nation. As mentioned above, the main WWII victims relevant to the SPT agenda are sex slaves, including comfort women, and forced labor victims. Sex slaves are undoubtedly one of the major victims of WWII, especially because both Japan and South Korea have not reached a definitive conclusion on the topic. South Korea had nearly 200,000 Korean women and young girls recruited as sex slaves. They were deceived as being sent to help the Japanese army, then were brutally raped by the soldiers. According to survivors, 90 percent of comfort women did not survive in such conditions as they were raped 20~30 times and up to 40 times per day during the weekends. Even after Korea gained its independence in 1945, Japan did not reveal any signs of regret or apology. Against their own will, Koreans were sent to become sex slaves, and no actions were taken for the following 50 years since they were recognized as an embarrassment to the nation. Unfortunately, the comfort women incident was considered a shameful event, which prompted Korea not to bring up the issue for 50 years. As it was left silent for all those years, many victims died, leaving only 18~20 victims alive. In 1965, South Korea and Japan signed an agreement to normalize diplomatic relations between the two nations. However, as the victims started to call for compensations in the 21st century, the Korean government, in 1991, started to strongly advocate for comfort women, consistently requesting Japan for a sincere apology. In 1993, the Chief Cabinet Secretary, Yohei Kono, offered a sincere apology to the comfort women, strongly emphasizing that it was a wrong act. Not so long after, in 2007, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe denied charges of Japan coercing comfort women against their will, frustrating many Koreans, including the victims. It contradicted the claims from 1993, which began campaigns and protests from the Koreans regarding advocating compensation for comfort women, such as the ‘Wednesday demonstration’. Later in 2015, President Park and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe came together to finalize the issue of comfort women. Japan paid $8.3 million to Korea, and both agreed not to bring this matter again once this agreement is signed; however, many Koreans and the victims claimed that Japan did not issue an official apology and continued to protest for a sincere apology from Japan. Although President Park failed to address the issue, the current president, President Moon, has been putting efforts to pressure the Japanese government to have them pay compensation for the victims. Other countries such as China have also been involved in the comfort women issue as many Chinese women were also sex slaves during WWII. However, China did not pressurize much of the Japanese government since Japan was their major trading partner. DPRK also could not receive proper compensation due to its uncooperative behavior towards the issue at hand. Many Koreans, along with Chinese workers, were sent to forced labor in Japan regarding the forced labor. The Korean victims have fought for their rights and compensation; however, similar to the comfort women cases, the Japanese court refused to pay compensation to the victims because they claimed they have already done it in the 1965 treaty. Although certain Japanese companies did show a sign of sincere apology, the majority of them remained still, which officially began the trade war between Japan and Korea. Korean citizens began to boycott all Japanese products, which Japan responded with restrictions on export controls on electronic raw materials on July 1st of 2019. This continued as South Korea filed a complaint against Japan to the World Trade Organization (WTO). Due to the COVID pandemic, the trade war is worsening, and communication among nations has been challenging. What is worse, previous agreements made between nations that involve a large amount of monetary funds have been misused in many cases. For example, Asian Women Fund (AWF), an agreement created by Japan, had significant flaws within its contributed funds. Japan claimed it contributed 4.8 billion yen to the AWF to implement atonement projects to support comfort women in the Philippines, Korea, and Taiwan until 2002. However, the actual financial support provided to the victims was 765 million yen, meaning that 3.6 billion yen was used for other purposes regarding AWF. This involves massive monetary funds, which must be looked over to solve the conflict accurately. As such, there were previous attempts to mitigate the political tensions through initiating diplomatic talks, but none proved to be helpful.
2. Definition of Key Terms WWII World War II was a massive war that occured between Nazi Germany and other European powers such as Briain and France. It lasted from 1939 to 1945, which Germany formed alliances with Italy and Japan, combating the powers of Britain, France, USSR, and the US. The constant bombing and destruction of nations, prompted all of them to develop fatal technologies that will sabotage their enemies. WWII ended with both the surrender of Germany, Italy and Japan, the Axis power, and the European countries as well, after the sucidie of Adolf Hitler.
War Crime War crime consists of a variety of crimes that occur within the violation of international humanitarian law regarding an armed conflict. Some significant examples are forced labour, sexual assault, taking of hostages, and so on.
Comfort Women Comfort women, otherwise known as sex slaves, consist of women and young girls who were forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese Army. The Japanese authorities considered such acts as a factor to create a stable and strong Japanese Army by setting ‘comfort stations.’ For the soldiers, comfort stations, were meant for satisfying their sexual desires, by constantly raping women and girls against their will. Unfortunately, the comfort women were mostly deceived, as they were told, from the beginning, that they would be working for the Japanese military.
Forced Labour Forced labour is known as the forced work or service that people must perform involuntarily. More exactly, they are “coerced to work through the use of violence or intimidation, or by more subtle means such as manipulated debt, retention of identity papers or threats of denunciation to immigration authorities” (ILO). Although forced labour was more significant in China, both Koreans and Chinese faced issues regarding receiving proper compensation within forced labour victims existing in both nations. Japan continuously declines the request for compensations regarding forced labour; therefore, as of now, no proper compensations were received from forced labour.
Trade War The trade war is a retaliation between nations constantly imposing tariffs and restricting one another's international trade. Although a trade war usually occurs between two nations, it could have side effects on other countries that are not necessarily part of the war. A trade war only limits a nation from globalism and damages both consumers and the country's businesses. It's fairly similar to sanctions, which negatively affects countries' relations, but, most importantly, the trading process.
3. Timeline of Key Events 29 August 1910-15 August 1945 - Japanese Colonization of Korea From august 29th of 1910, Korea was annexed by the Japanese Empire until the mid 1945. It was left as a traumatic event for the Koreans since all their cultural inputs such as language, religion, and even their nationalities were being replaced by Japan's forceful cultural assimilation. Although many Koreans tried to fight for the nation’s independence, most were brutally killed by the Japanese soldiers and nearly 725,000 Korean workers were sent to work in Japan or other facilities. During this period of time, Korean women and young girls were deceived of being sent to work for the Japanese military, then were raped by the soldiers. This sense of brutality continued until the USSR and the US occupied the Korean peninsula at the end of WWII. 22 June 1965 - Japan-Korea Treaty on Basic Relations The ‘Treaty on Basic Relations between Japan and the Republic of Korea’ was officially signed on 22nd of June in 1965, which had the purpose of normalizing diplomatic relations between Japan and South Korea. Most of the agreement was held concerning economic cooperation, such as Japan providing South Korea with 300 million USD for war compensations, $200 million “in loans together with $300 million in loans for private trust.” However, within the issues regarding property, rights, and interests, South Korea along with the United Nations claimed that Comfort Women and Forced Labor take major part with human rights; however, the Japanese government continued to claim that the money within the money provided from them already included every compensation including the comfort women issue and forced labor.
8 January 1992 - Wednesday Demonstration From early January of 1992, Korean activists have been protesting every wednesday regarding the issue of Comfort Women. Their only purpose of the protests was to receive a sincere apology from the Japanese authorities. Every wednesday, in front of the Japanese embassy, Korean activists have been protesting even after the Comfort Women agreement signed in 2015, as they failed to meet the demands of the victims.
4 August 1993 - Kono Statement Now after about 50 years, the Chief Cabinet Secretary, Yohei Kono, offered a sincere apology to the comfort women, strongly emphasizing that it was a wrong act. Through the close case study, they recognized that the women and young girls were deceived and recruited against their wills and that the comfort stations have been opened for a long period of time, ruining and killing countless lives. Through this, they issued an apology to the victims on August 4th of 1993.
28 December 2015 - Comfort Women Agreement Years after the apology, South Korea and Japan came together in 2015 to finalize the issue of comfort women. President Park and Prime Minister Abe agreed to not bring this matter again once this agreement is signed; however Koreans, especially the victims, were extremely frustrated by such decisions since they considered Japan’s apology as insincere. Nevertheless, Japan did issue an apology with $8.3 million for the living victims from comfort stations. As mentioned above, even after this agreement, many Koreans continued to protest for a sincere apology from the Japanese government, in which Japan refused to act upon.
1 June 2016 - Mitsubishi Materials Apologizes to Chinese WWII Forced Labor Victims Japanese companies such as Kajima Construction and Nishimatsu Construction, sent an apology to the Chinese forced laborers of WWII. As 3 victims existed, they agreed to compensate them by granting a financial compensation of $15,000 to each of the victims, building memorials on the mining site, and continuing the search for other victims. Despite such compensation, some of the victims were concerned by the fact that they did not emphasize the traumatic experience of the victims and collusion with the Japanese government.
30 October 2018 - Korean Supreme Court Rules Against Japanese Steel Company Regarding the issues of forced labour, the victims have fought for their rights and further compensation, which the Japanese court has declined for decades. Even the Korean Supreme Court continued to debate upon this issue; however, they eventually requested Japanese steel company to compensate the victims. As usual, the Japanese government refused to as they claimed that it violated the 1965 treaty: settlement of all issues during the Japanese colonization. Unfortunately, the forced labour victims could not receive proper compensation.
1 July 2019 - Korea-Japan Trade War As the Japanese companies continued to refuse to provide proper compensation to the forced labour victims, a trade war between Japan and Korea occured. It began from the Korean citizens boycotting Japanese products, prohibiting the people from visiting all Japanese company owned stores and discriminating against all Japanese people. Then, Japan responded by restricting export controls on electronic raw materials on July 1st of 2019. This continued as South Korea violated the 2015 bilateral agreement by withdrawing from the Japanese funded Reconciliation and Healing Foundation. Although attempts have been made to reduce the tensions, it all failed and Japan decided to remove Korea from its favored trading partner. Korea, on the other hand, filed an official complaint against Japanese export controls to the WTO. The trade war is continuously ongoing between both nations.
16 September 2020 - Yoon Mee-Hyang Suspension from Democratic Party Yoon Mee-hyang, the democratic membership representative, who served as a proportional lawmaker in helping the comfort women, got charged with exploiting at least one of the comfort women victims, which eventually led to her suspension. Although she was accused over decades, Yoon continually denied her charges. One of the most significant incidents occured from her charges against Gil Won-ok, a 92-year-old survivor. The prosecution claims that while Gil was suffering from dementia, Yoon pressed her to “donate a total of 79.2 million won ($67,102) to the Korean Council between November 2017 and January this year” (“Yoon Mee-Hyang Suspended from Democratic Party”). Despite the continuous fight for her innocence, Yoon officially became suspended from serving on any in-house positions.
8 January 2021-23 January 2021 - Seoul Central District Court’s Comfort Women Decision On January 8th of 2021, the Seoul Central District Court filed a lawsuit to the Japanese government to compensate the 12 Korean comfort women with the payment of 100 million Korean won. This lawsuit for the 12 victims was officially filed in 2016; however, as the years passed, six of the victims passed away, leaving their family members to continue on with the trial. The Japanese government rejected the ruling on January 23rd claiming that “South Korea should take steps to correct violations of international law and that ruling will never be accepted” (Shin). Without taking any further actions, South Korea agreed to reach a settlement with the comfort women through effective communication without additional compensation from Tokyo.
18 February 2021-Present - Harvard Professor John Mark Ramseyer’s Comfort Women Claim & Response from Korean Comfort Women A Harvard University professor John Mark Ramseyer wrote a paper on Japan’s wartime sex slavery, in which he claimed that “comfort women were prostitues.” Not only that, but he also made additional claims of how they gained profits through such unspeakable abuses. From distorting such historical facts, Ramseyer received a medal from the Japanese government. This was certainly not his first time as the Professor continuously released papers about sex slavery and forced labor victims, solely speaking from the perspectives of Japan. Consequently, many US scholars along with Korean experts have refuted the journal by stating that the paper was “poorly resourced and evidently fatous and that it’s important to hold accountable those who turn fake news into facts'' (“US Scholars Refute Harvard Professor’s Comfort Women Article”). Lee Yong-soo, a former comfort woman, formed a response to Professor Ramseyer’s paper, mainly telling the Harvard University students to “ignore that man” (Arirang News). While claiming that this paper could be seen as a “wake up call, since (they) haven’t been making any progress” on the issue “despite (their) efforts,” Lee continuously called upon the Korean government to raise the issue at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
4. Positions of Key Member Nations and Other Bodies on the Issue Japan Japan, taking one of the most significant positions regarding this issue, has been neglecting all existence of both comfort women and forced labour incidents. As all the post-war Japanese authorities removed all of the official documents related to comfort women, there is a possibility that Japan might not have been aware of their unjust historical records. However as the protests of victims started to emerge during the 21st century, Japan gradually admitted its wrongdoings. It claimed that they were ashamed and afraid to undermine their national reputations. Both Japan and Korea tried to settle on this issue by signing the 1965 treaty along with the 2015 comfort women agreement. However, many Koreans expressed dissatisfaction regarding the efforts and claimed that Japan never issued a sincere apology to the victims. Then, as President Moon requested for paying further compensations to the victims, Japan’s government ordered all Japanese companies to avoid such actions since it will continuously ask them for compensation. In the perspective of Japan, they have already compensated more than once. Incidents such as when the former president of South Korean Park Chung-hee used the money while never telling the comfort women or related victims that they received such compensations, and the Yoon Mee-hyang scandal, it is clear to Japan that there is no need for its nation to provide anymore compensations. Therefore, although some companies showed a sign of apology through financial compensations, most of the Japanese companies remained silent. With regards to the forced labour, Japan, once again, claimed that all responsibility has been held and settled during the 1965 treaty and it will not violate the treaty.
Korea As mentioned, South Korea is one of the major victims of the issues regarding their colonial period. South Korea believes that Japan’s apologies were never as sincere and continuously requests the nation for an apology and additional compensations. However, Korea for around 50 years, just before 1991, considered the issue of comfort women as a shameful event, which prompted them to not bring up the issue. Then due to the anger and frustration of the citizens, South Korea advocated former comfort women from 1991. President Park, for example, attempted to settle the issue through the 2015 Comfort Women Agreement; however, it failed as the victims and many Koreans disapproved of the sincerity of Japan. Then, President Moon, on the other hand, has been actively contributing to support the comfort women by trying to renegotiate the deal during the 99th anniversary of Korean independence. Unfortunately, the efforts created further consequences such as the trade war between two nations since Japan continuously refused to pay compensations for the victims. As a response, Korea has been attempting to file an official complaint to the World Trade Organization.
Democratic People’s Republic of Korea Similar to South Korea, DPRK is also one of the major victims of the war. However as Korea was already divided into two sovereign states, unlike South Korea, DPRK did not seem to put much effort into taking measures regarding the comfort women issues. Due to its uncooperative behavior, they failed to receive compensation for the victims; however, they did not seem to take specific measures on such matters.
China Just like the DPRK and South Korea, China holds a similar position on this issue. China is also one of the victims of sexual slavery and forced labour during the WWII. The comfort women were first recruited from Korea and Taiwan, which eventually also dragged in China, Philippines and Indonesia. In China about two dozens of the victims are alive, which the government takes part to ensure and Japan to not forget the lessons they have encountered from their unjust history. However, Chinese courts did not consider comfort women as cases and refused to look over since Japan was one of their trade partners. In 1994, Chinese civilians were forced into working for Japanese corporations. Just like South Korea, the victims filed a lawsuit against the Japanese government after 4 years; however, Japan, once again, rejected the offer and did not show proper compensation. This has further worsened the relations between Japan and China.
United States of America Like Russia, the US has not taken a first-hand account within the issue regarding compensation of WWII victims as it is based on the victims in Northeast Asia. However, it has shown a sense of sympathy towards the South Korean comfort women through the construction of monumental memorials. As the US holds both South Korea and Japan as its major trade partner, it has not taken a clear stance on the trade war between the two nations. The US has been more active within its trade war with China since it has occurred quite recently and still ongoing. Although it does not have a specific position with this issue, the stance of the US, the world power nation, would be vital in terms of achieving peace.
Russian Federation Russia does not take a specific position regarding the issue; however, it does have significant relationships with the involved nations such as China. Russia shares similar economic and political models as China, serving as China’s major trade partner and an ally. Not only that, but Russia is also going through a territorial dispute with Japan, the Kuril Islands of Japan, which indicates that Russia will most likely stand by the stance of China.
5. Suggested Solutions There are countless compensating victims of WWII, digging very deeply into the history of many countries. Among the many, sexual slavery and forced labour has been the major cause of victims. As it involves many nations such as South Korea, Japan, China, and Taiwan, it is crucial to have some kind of a private database, where it keeps and organizes all of the historical records, previous attempts, and records of monetary funds. As all the post-war Japanese authorities removed most of the official documents related to comfort women, it is crucial to keep the ones that still exist, even the ones within the range 50~100 years ago. Since countries do not have access to the official documents, it would be vital to have at least the ones from a certain period of time, in which they can look back and revise. The UN commission on Human Rights (UNHCR), World Trade Organization (WTO) along with countries such as China, Japan, and Korea could aid in the process of developing a comprehensive private database to decrease bias and historical conflicts. Within the database itself, it should keep all of the records regarding the issue of comfort women and forced labor to revise them for future conferences; some of the records would include historical records of remaining official documents that were removed from the post-war Japanese authorities, previous attempts to solve the issue such as the 1965 treaty, the 2015 Korea-Japan agreement, and Mitsubishi Materials financial compensations. As there were continuous loopholes regarding the national and international monetary funds with regards to the issue of comfort women and forced labor, the database must organize such records to prevent major flaws that appeared within previously contributed funds like the Asian Women Fund (AWF). This could be done through compiling records of monetary funds that have been contributed to the victims, having the database available to all nations that took even the smallest part of the issues, the US, and the organizations above, to take accurate and fair measures, and having nations to go through the database to get funds checked. Inviting Japan and South Korea, along with the nations that are willing to take part, to normalize relations, under the supervision of the UN, through negotiations on the trade war between South Korea and Japan could be another possible solution. As much as the US and China trade war, the countries with the world's two largest economies, is a large ongoing issue, the trade war between Japan and South Korea has been significant as well. Well, it's not that no attempts have been made to solve this trade war; both Japan and South Korea have been offering possible solutions regarding the issue such as a creation of a third party or a joint fund among companies. However, none of them satisfied the nations and rather aggravated the relationship. Therefore, it would be crucial for them to hold bi-annual meetings and virtual meetings during the COVID pandemic, with WTO to precisely revise the previous attempts to resolve the trade war such as the creation of a third party or the joint fund among companies, and the existing sanctions that are imposed on both South Korea and Japan, such as restricted exports and removal from the whitelist. Some relevant topics they could talk about during some bilateral meetings held between Japan and Korea could specific ways to reinvigorate Japanese-Korean trade agreements regarding Japanese technological exports to the Republic of Korea, and creating a deal or an agreement on potential standards on the degree of specific penalties that cover such problems regarding aspects such as the duration, severity, purpose, and conditions of improvement. Resolving the North-East Asian controversy of compensating victims of WWII involves many countries in Asia; however, most importantly, the victims from each of nations are the most significant figures that the issue must rely on. Countries like South Korea have been showing a lack of effective communication among its victims, which caused many withdrawals from treaties like the 2015 Comfort Women agreement. To solve this they must regularly communicate amongst the governmental officials, experts, and the nation’s victims through triennial meetings to prevent the victims from individually filing or sueing the Japanese government for unjust acts. Since all compensations have been provided through money, it would be crucial to discuss the nation’s victims’ demand on the compensations that do not necessarily lie on money since monetary funds have been unsuccessful to certain countries and victims. Not only that, but specifically for Korea, Korea should also set the settlement between the victims along with the governmental officials regarding the term and the degree of ‘sincerity’. Lastly, another negotiating platform could be formed in each nation where they could effectively communicate with the victims within their own nation, where the victims could easily approach to share their external and internal concerns regarding their compensations. 6. 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