The Transnational Redress Movement for the Victims of Japanese Military Sexual Slavery

This book examines the redress movement for the victims of Japanese military sexual slavery in South Korea, Japan, and the U.S. comprehensively. The Japanese military forcefully mobilized about 80,000-200,000 Asian women to Japanese military brothels and forced them into sexual slavery during the Asian-Pacific War (1932-1945). Korean "comfort women" are believed to have been the largest group because of Korea’s colonial status. The redress movement for the victims started in South Korea in the late 1980s. The emergence of Korean "comfort women" to society to tell the truth beginning in 1991 and the discovery of Japanese historical documents, proving the responsibility of the Japanese military for establishing and operating military brothels by a Japanese historian in 1992 accelerated the redress movement for the victims. The movement has received strong support from UN human rights bodies, the U.S. and other Western countries. It has also greatly contributed to raising people’s consciousness of sexual violence against women at war. However, the Japanese government has not made a sincere apology and compensation to the victims to bring justice to the victims.