{"title":"The 2015 South Korean–Japanese Agreement on ‘Comfort Women’: A Critical Analysis","authors":"Klea Ramaj","doi":"10.1163/15718123-bja10127","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"\n Before and during the Second World War, Japan established a legalised system of sexual slavery, in which approximately up to 200 000 women, euphemistically known as ‘comfort women’, were exploited. Although the victims came from all the regions of the Japanese Empire, the majority of them were Korean. While initial reconciliation attempts were met with refusal, a seemingly positive step was taken in December 2015, when South Korea and Japan announced that they had reached an agreement which would ‘finally and irreversibly’ resolve this issue. The main argument developed throughout the present article is that the agreement does not do justice in addressing the victims’ needs and rights in many ways, with the need for acknowledgement and memorialisation being primarily neglected. A critical evaluation of the 2015 agreement is particularly important in light of its suspension due to the dissolution of the Reconciliation and Healing Foundation.","PeriodicalId":55966,"journal":{"name":"International Criminal Law Review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8000,"publicationDate":"2022-02-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"International Criminal Law Review","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15718123-bja10127","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"LAW","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Before and during the Second World War, Japan established a legalised system of sexual slavery, in which approximately up to 200 000 women, euphemistically known as ‘comfort women’, were exploited. Although the victims came from all the regions of the Japanese Empire, the majority of them were Korean. While initial reconciliation attempts were met with refusal, a seemingly positive step was taken in December 2015, when South Korea and Japan announced that they had reached an agreement which would ‘finally and irreversibly’ resolve this issue. The main argument developed throughout the present article is that the agreement does not do justice in addressing the victims’ needs and rights in many ways, with the need for acknowledgement and memorialisation being primarily neglected. A critical evaluation of the 2015 agreement is particularly important in light of its suspension due to the dissolution of the Reconciliation and Healing Foundation.
期刊介绍:
Thus there is also a need for criminological, sociological and historical research on the issues of ICL. The Review publishes in-depth analytical research that deals with these issues. The analysis may cover: • the substantive and procedural law on the international level; • important cases from national jurisdictions which have a bearing on general issues; • criminological and sociological; and, • historical research.