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BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE OF THE TRIBUNAL |
The WOMEN'S INTERNATIONAL WAR-CRIMES TRIBUNAL ON JAPAN'S MILITARY SEXUAL SLAVERY is apeople's tribunal organized by Asian women and human rights organizations and supported by international NGOs. It aims to hear the cases of sexual slavery and other crimes involving sexual violence committed against women by Japan. Hundreds of thousands of young women in the Asia Pacific region were either raped or deceived and abducted to become "comfort women" for the Japanese Imperial Army before and during the Second World War. After the Second World War, sexual violence committed by the Japanese Imperial Army was hardly prosecuted by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (The Tokyo Tribunal) as set-up by the Allied Forces. It was only in the Batavia (Indonesia) Trial where the case of 35 Dutch women victimized in Indonesia was tried against 12 Japanese Army officers. Charges were made on the grounds of having committed war crimes and in defiance of the laws and customs of war in the Dutch East Indies in 1944. One of the accused was condemned to death and others were sentenced to imprisonment ranging from 2 to 15 years. That was the only trial in history that gave justice to the "comfort women". At present, the Japanese government continues to deny any legal responsibility for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed against women before and during the Second World War. Eight court cases have been filed by survivors from South Korea, China, Taiwan, the Philippines and Japan in the Tokyo District Court and other Japanese courts and all lost their cases. Some of these cases are on appeal at the Japanese Higher Court. As the millennium comes to an end, it is but proper to give the women survivors who are all of an advanced age a sense of what constitutes justice. Discussion of organizing the International Women's War Crimes Tribunal started in April 1998, when members of the VAWW-NET International (Violence against Women in War Network) met in Geneva to attend the session of the UN Commission on Human Rights. Immediately following this VAWW-NET Japan formally proposed to hold the Tribunal at the 5th Asian Women's Solidarity Forum on the "comfort women" issue in Seoul. Identified as convenors for the Tribunal were VAWW NET Japan, the Korean Council and ASCENT-Philippines, and the other participating victimized countries of Japan's military sexual slavery as members of the International Organizing Committee (IOC). The organizers are convinced that redress, for women victimized in time of wars and conflict situations from the past to the present, is possible in the light of the principles of international law, humanitarian law, human conscience, humanity and gender justice. The Tribunal has no real power to enforce its judgement, but as a people's and women's initiative, it carries the moral authority to demand wide acceptance and enforcement of the judgement by the international community and civil society and so pave the way for law reforms in national governments. The Objectives of the Tokyo Tribunal 1. To receive from each country evidence highlighting the grave nature of the crimes committed against the "comfort women" and to clarify the consequent responsibility of the Japanese Government and its military; 2. To have a clear analysis of the gendered nature of the crimes and to establish a gendersensitive approach to the issues of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide; 3. To involve the international community in shedding light about the nature of the crimes committed against the"comfort women"ofAsia and to identify steps to be taken by the Japanese Government; 4. To create an international movement supporting women's issues on violence against women under war and armed conflict situations; and 5. To end the impunity with which wartime sexual violence has been committed against women and to prevent such crimes from happening in the future. |
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