World War II sex slaves seek resolution for Japanese apology
Even after more than 60 years, the defiance remained as Jan Ruff O’Herne described her refusal to submit to the Japanese soldiers who repeatedly raped her as a young woman in Indonesia.
She told U.S. lawmakers how she shaved her head to make herself unattractive. How she hid, one time even in a tree. How she huddled together and prayed with other captive “comfort women” - a euphemism for the up to 200,000 women who historians say were forced to have sex with millions of Japanese soldiersduring the war. How she punched and kicked and screamed, even though it invariably meant she would be beaten worse.
“Never did any Japanese rape me without a fight. I fought each one of them,” she said Thursday, testifying at a House of Representatives hearing of the Foreign Affairs subcommittee on Asia, in which O’Herne and two other former comfort women pleadedwith U.S. lawmakers to adopt a resolution urging Japan to apologize formally.
The memories of being raped and beaten day and night, even by the doctor who examined her for venereal disease, “have tortured my mind all my life,” said O’Herne, a former Dutch colonist bornin Java who now lives in Australia. “I have forgiven the Japanese for what they did to me, but I can never forget.”
O’Herne and two South Korean victims appeared in support of a nonbinding resolution that urges Japan to “formally acknowledge, apologize and accept historical responsibility in a clear and unequivocal manner” for the women’s ordeal.
“I am so embarrassed. I am so ashamed,” said Lee Yong-soo, speaking through an interpreter of her rape and torture. “But this is something I cannot just keep to myself.”
The resolution does not recommend that Japan pay reparations. Besides an official apology, it demands that Japan reject those who say the sexual enslavement never happened and to educate children about the comfort women’s experience. It was unclearwhen the House panel would meet again to consider whether to endorse the resolution.
Supporters of the resolution want an apology similar to the one the U.S. government gave to Japanese-Americans forced into internment camps during World War II. That apology was approvedby the Congress and signed into law by President Ronald Reagan in 1988.
Japan objects to the resolution, which has led to unease in an otherwise strong U.S.-Japanese relationship. Its leaders have apologized repeatedly. Former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, for instance, said in 2001 that he felt sincere remorse for the comfort women’s “immeasurable and painful experiences.”