The confort woman issue

The U.S. official documents has clearly defined them by Interrogation during W.W.2nd. Aug.20-Sept.10,1944. Details:http://goo.gl/WF15t
"comfort girl" is nothing more than a prostitute or "professional camp follower" attached to the Japanese Army for the benefit of the soldiers.

Even though Korean people have been insisting that the confort woman issue is "human rights issue" and "exploitation of women's sex", this doesn't seem to me nothing more than haight activity affected by crazy enthusiasm based on their long time anti Japan education.
If they insist that this is the activity for comprehensive women's rights, not aiming slanderous defamation to Japan, How could they explain about korean domestic miserable situation on prostitution issue?  Watch out on your foot first! goo.gl/eRme09

Manal al-Sharif: A Saudi woman who dared to drive

Allow me to start this talk with a question to everyone. You know that all over the world, people fight for their freedom, fight for their rights. Some battle oppressive governments. Others battle oppressive societies. Which battle do you think is harder? Allow me to try to answer this question in the few coming minutes.

Let me take you back two years ago in my life. It was the bedtime of my son, Aboody. He was five at the time. After finishing his bedtime rituals, he looked at me and he asked a question:"Mommy, are we bad people?"

I was shocked. "Why do you say such things, Aboody?"

Earlier that day, I noticed some bruises on his face when he came from school. He wouldn't tell me what happened. [But now] he was ready to tell.

"Two boys hit me today in school. They told me, 'We saw your mom on Facebook. You and your mom should be put in jail.'"

I've never been afraid to tell Aboody anything. I've been always a proud woman of my achievements. But those questioning eyes of my son were my moment of truth, when it all came together. You see, I'm a Saudi woman who had been put in jail for driving a car in a country where women are not supposed to drive cars. Just for giving me his car keys, my own brother was detained twice, and he was harassed to the point he had to quit his job as a geologist, leave the country with his wife and two-year-old son. My father had to sit in a Friday sermon listening to the imam condemning women drivers and calling them prostitutes amongst tons of worshippers, some of them our friends and family of my own father. I was faced with an organized defamation campaign in the local media combined with false rumorsshared in family gatherings, in the streets and in schools. It all hit me. It came into focus that those kids did not mean to be rude to my son. They were just influenced by the adults around them. And it wasn't about me, and it wasn't a punishment for taking the wheel and driving a few miles. It was a punishment for daring to challenge the society's rules.

But my story goes beyond this moment of truth of mine. Allow me to give you a briefing about my story. It was May, 2011, and I was complaining to a work colleague about the harassments I had to face trying to find a ride back home, although I have a car and an international driver's license. As long as I've known, women in Saudi Arabia have been always complaining about the ban, but it's been 20 years since anyone tried to do anything about it, a whole generation ago.

He broke the good/bad news in my face. "But there is no law banning you from driving."

I looked it up, and he was right. There wasn't an actual law in Saudi Arabia. It was just a custom and traditions that are enshrined in rigid religious fatwas and imposed on women. That realization ignited the idea of June 17, where we encouraged women to take the wheel and go drive. It was a few weeks later, we started receiving all these "Man wolves will rape you if you go and drive." A courageous woman, her name is Najla Hariri, she's a Saudi woman in the city of Jeddah, she drove a car and she announced but she didn't record a video. We needed proof.

So I drove. I posted a video on YouTube. And to my surprise, it got hundreds of thousands of views the first day. What happened next, of course? I started receiving threats to be killed, raped, just to stop this campaign.

The Saudi authorities remained very quiet. That really creeped us out. I was in the campaign with other Saudi women and even men activists. We wanted to know how the authoritieswould respond on the actual day, June 17, when women go out and drive. So this time I asked my brother to come with me and drive by a police car. It went fast. We were arrested, signed a pledge not to drive again, released. Arrested again, he was sent to detention for one day, and I was sent to jail. I wasn't sure why I was sent there, because I didn't face any charges in the interrogation. But what I was sure of was my innocence. I didn't break a law, and I kept my abaya — it's a black cloak we wear in Saudi Arabia before we leave the house — and my fellow prisoners kept asking me to take it off, but I was so sure of my innocence, I kept saying,"No, I'm leaving today." Outside the jail, the whole country went into a frenzy, some attacking me badly, and others supportive and even collecting signatures in a petition to be sent to the king to release me. I was released after nine days.

June 17 comes. The streets were packed with police cars and religious police cars, but some hundred brave Saudi women broke the ban and drove that day. None were arrested. We broke the taboo.

(Applause)

So I think by now, everyone knows that we can't drive, or women are not allowed to drive, in Saudi Arabia, but maybe few know why. Allow me to help you answer this question.

There was this official study that was presented to the Shura Council -- it's the consultative council appointed by the king in Saudi Arabia — and it was done by a local professor, a university professor. He claims it's done based on a UNESCO study. And the study states, the percentage of rape, adultery, illegitimate children, even drug abuse, prostitution in countries where women drive is higher than countries where women don't drive.

(Laughter)

I know, I was like this, I was shocked. I was like, "We are the last country in the world where women don't drive." So if you look at the map of the world, that only leaves two countries:Saudi Arabia, and the other society is the rest of the world.

We started a hashtag on Twitter mocking the study, and it made headlines around the world.

[BBC News: 'End of virginity' if women drive, Saudi cleric warns]

(Laughter)

And only then we realized it's so empowering to mock your oppressor. It strips it away of its strongest weapon: fear.

This system is based on ultra-conservative traditions and customs that deal with women as if they are inferior and they need a guardian to protect them, so they need to take permission from this guardian, whether verbal or written, all their lives. We are minors until the day we die.And it becomes worse when it's enshrined in religious fatwas based on wrong interpretation of the sharia law, or the religious laws. What's worst, when they become codified as laws in the system, and when women themselves believe in their inferiority, and they even fight those who try to question these rules.

So for me, it wasn't only about these attacks I had to face. It was about living two totally different perceptions of my personality, of my person -- the villain back in my home country,and the hero outside.

Just to tell you, two stories happened in the last two years. One of them is when I was in jail.I'm pretty sure when I was in jail, everyone saw titles in the international media something like this during these nine days I was in jail.

But in my home country, it was a totally different picture. It was more like this: "Manal al-Sharif faces charges of disturbing public order and inciting women to drive."

I know.

"Manal al-Sharif withdraws from the campaign."

Ah, it's okay. This is my favorite.

"Manal al-Sharif breaks down and confesses: 'Foreign forces incited me.'"

(Laughter)

And it goes on, even trial and flogging me in public. So it's a totally different picture.

I was asked last year to give a speech at the Oslo Freedom Forum. I was surrounded by this love and the support of people around me, and they looked at me as an inspiration. At the same time, I flew back to my home country, they hated that speech so much. The way they called it: a betrayal to the Saudi country and the Saudi people, and they even started a hashtag called #OsloTraitor on Twitter. Some 10,000 tweets were written in that hashtag,while the opposite hashtag, #OsloHero, there was like a handful of tweets written. They even started a poll. More than 13,000 voters answered this poll: whether they considered me a traitor or not after that speech. Ninety percent said yes, she's a traitor. So it's these two totally different perceptions of my personality.

For me, I'm a proud Saudi woman, and I do love my country, and because I love my country, I'm doing this. Because I believe a society will not be free if the women of that society are not free. (Applause) Thank you. (Applause) Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.(Applause)

Thank you.

But you learn lessons from these things that happen to you. I learned to be always there. The first thing, I got out of jail, of course after I took a shower, I went online, I opened my Twitter account and my Facebook page, and I've been always very respectful to those people who are opining to me. I would listen to what they say, and I would never defend myself with words only. I would use actions. When they said I should withdraw from the campaign, I filed the first lawsuit against the general directorate of traffic police for not issuing me a driver's license.There are a lot of people also -- very big support, like those 3,000 people who signed the petition to release me. We sent a petition to the Shura Council in favor of lifting the ban on Saudi women, and there were, like, 3,500 citizens who believed in that and they signed that petition. There were people like that, I just showed some examples, who are amazing, who are believing in women's rights in Saudi Arabia, and trying, and they are also facing a lot of hate because of speaking up and voicing their views.

Saudi Arabia today is taking small steps toward enhancing women's rights. The Shura Council that's appointed by the king, by royal decree of King Abdullah, last year there were 30 women assigned to that Council, like 20 percent. 20 percent of the Council. (Applause) The same time, finally, that Council, after rejecting our petition four times for women driving, they finally accepted it last February. (Applause) After being sent to jail or sentenced lashing, or sent to a trial, the spokesperson of the traffic police said, we will only issue traffic violation for women drivers. The Grand Mufti, who is the head of the religious establishment in Saudi Arabia, he said, it's not recommended for women to drive. It used to be haram, forbidden, by the previous Grand Mufti.

So for me, it's not about only these small steps. It's about women themselves.

A friend once asked me, she said, "So when do you think this women driving will happen?"

I told her, "Only if women stop asking 'When?' and take action to make it now."

So it's not only about the system, it's also about us women to drive our own life, I'd say.

So I have no clue, really, how I became an activist. And I don't know how I became one now.But all I know, and all I'm sure of, in the future when someone asks me my story, I will say, "I'm proud to be amongst those women who lifted the ban, fought the ban, and celebrated everyone's freedom."

So the question I started my talk with, who do you think is more difficult to face, oppressive governments or oppressive societies? I hope you find clues to answer that from my speech.

Thank you, everyone.

(Applause) Thank you. (Applause) Thank you. (Appla

河野内閣官房長官談話（含む：英文） 平成5年8月4日

慰安婦関係調査結果発表に関する

河野内閣官房長官談話

平成5年8月4日

　いわゆる従軍慰安婦問題については、政府は、一昨年12月より、調査を進めて来たが、今般その結果がまとまったので発表することとした。

　今次調査の結果、長期に、かつ広範な地域にわたって慰安所が設置され、数多くの慰安婦が存在したことが認められた。慰安所は、当時の軍当局の要請により設営されたものであり、慰安所の設置、管理及び慰安婦の移送については、旧日本軍が直接あるいは間接にこれに関与した。慰安婦の募集については、軍の要請を受けた業者が主としてこれに当たったが、その場合も、甘言、強圧による等、本人たちの意思に反して集められた事例が数多くあり、更に、官憲等が直接これに加担したこともあったことが明らかになった。また、慰安所における生活は、強制的な状況の下での痛ましいものであった。

　なお、戦地に移送された慰安婦の出身地については、日本を別とすれば、朝鮮半島が大きな比重を占めていたが、当時の朝鮮半島は我が国の統治下にあり、その募集、移送、管理等も、甘言、強圧による等、総じて本人たちの意思に反して行われた。

　いずれにしても、本件は、当時の軍の関与の下に、多数の女性の名誉と尊厳を深く傷つけた問題である。政府は、この機会に、改めて、その出身地のいかんを問わず、いわゆる従軍慰安婦として数多の苦痛を経験され、心身にわたり癒しがたい傷を負われたすべての方々に対し心からお詫びと反省の気持ちを申し上げる。また、そのような気持ちを我が国としてどのように表すかということについては、有識者のご意見なども徴しつつ、今後とも真剣に検討すべきものと考える。

　われわれはこのような歴史の真実を回避することなく、むしろこれを歴史の教訓として直視していきたい。われわれは、歴史研究、歴史教育を通じて、このような問題を永く記憶にとどめ、同じ過ちを決して繰り返さないという固い決意を改めて表明する。

　なお、本問題については、本邦において訴訟が提起されており、また、国際的にも関心が寄せられており、政府としても、今後とも、民間の研究を含め、十分に関心を払って参りたい。

■ 和文リンク

http://www.mofa.go.jp/mofaj/area/taisen/kono.html

慰安婦関係調査結果発表に関する河野内閣官房長官談話

■ 英文　（外務省発表）

Statement by the Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono

on the result of the study on the issue of "comfort women"

August 4, 1993

The Government of Japan has been conducting a study on the issue of wartime "comfort women" since December 1991. I wish to announce the findings as a result of that study.

As a result of the study which indicates that comfort stations were operated in extensive areas for long periods, it is apparent that there existed a great number of comfort women. Comfort stations were operated in response to the request of the military authorities of the day. The then Japanese military was, directly or indirectly, involved in the establishment and management of the comfort stations and the transfer of comfort women. The recruitment of the comfort women was conducted mainly by private recruiters who acted in response to the request of the military. The Government study has revealed that in many cases they were recruited against their own will, through coaxing coercion, etc., and that, at times, administrative/military personnel directly took part in the recruitments. They lived in misery at comfort stations under a coercive atmosphere.

As to the origin of those comfort women who were transferred to the war areas, excluding those from Japan, those from the Korean Peninsula accounted for a large part. The Korean Peninsula was under Japanese rule in those days, and their recruitment, transfer, control, etc., were conducted generally against their will, through coaxing, coercion, etc.

Undeniably, this was an act, with the involvement of the military authorities of the day, that severely injured the honor and dignity of many women. The Government of Japan would like to take this opportunity once again to extend its sincere apologies and remorse to all those, irrespective of place of origin, who suffered immeasurable pain and incurable physical and psychological wounds as comfort women.

It is incumbent upon us, the Government of Japan, to continue to consider seriously, while listening to the views of learned circles, how best we can express this sentiment.

We shall face squarely the historical facts as described above instead of evading them, and take them to heart as lessons of history. We hereby reiterated our firm determination never to repeat the same mistake by forever engraving such issues in our memories through the study and teaching of history.

As actions have been brought to court in Japan and interests have been shown in this issue outside Japan, the Government of Japan shall continue to pay full attention to this matter, including private researched related thereto.

■ 英文リンク

Statement by the Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono

on the result of the study on the issue of "comfort women"

http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/women/fund/state9308.html

South Korea,Prostitution

http://www.ibtimes.com/south-korea-thriving-sex-industry-powerful-wealthy-super-state-1222647

South Korea, a wealthy, powerful Asian super-state, technology hub and stalwart U.S. ally, has a deep, dark secret. Prostitution and the sex trade flourish in South Korea just under the country’s shiny surface.

Despite its illegality, prostitution and the sex trade is so huge that the government once admitted it accounts for as much as 4 percent of South Korea’s annual gross domestic product -- about the size of the fishing and agriculture industries combined.

Indeed, paid sex is available all over South Korea -- in coffee shops, shopping malls, the barber shop, hotels, motels, as well as the so-called juicy bars, frequented by American soldiers, and the red-light districts, which operate openly. Internet chat rooms and cell phones have opened up whole new streams of business for ambitious prostitutes and pimps.

The South Korean government’s Ministry for Gender Equality estimates that about 500,000 women work in the national sex industry, though, according to the Korean Feminist Association, the actual number may exceed 1 million. If that estimate is closer to the truth, it would mean that 1 out of every 25 women in the country is selling her body for sex -- despite the passage of tough anti-sex-trafficking legislation in recent years. (For women between the ages of 15 and 29, up to one-fifth have worked in the sex industry at one time or another, according to estimates.)

Indeed, the sex industry (in the face of laws criminalizing and stigmatizing it) is so open that prostitutes periodically stage public protests to express their anger over anti-prostitution laws. Bizarrely, like Tibetan monks protesting China’s brutal rule of their homeland, some Korean prostitutes even set themselves on fire to promote their cause.

Naturally, demand is high.

According to the government-run Korean Institute of Criminology, one-fifth of men in their 20s buy sex at least four times a month, creating an endless customer base for prostitutes.

Even worse, child and teen prostitution are also prevalent in South Korea.

Al-Jazeera reported that some 200,000 South Korean youths run away from home annually, with many of them descending into the sex trade, according to a report by Seoul’s municipal government. A separate survey suggested that half of female runaways become prostitutes.

All these statistics fly in the face of South Korea’s stellar image as a society that consistently produces brilliant, hard-working, motivated students and technocrats. However, it is precisely that academic pressure (along with other family issues) that drives many of these teens onto the streets.

"No one ever told me it was wrong to prostitute myself, including my schoolteachers,” a runaway named Yu-ja told Al-Jazeera.

“I wish someone had told me. Girls should be taught that from an early age in class here in South Korea, but they aren't."

Not only is South Korea home to child and teen prostitution, but South Korean men are also driving such illicit trade in foreign countries, particularly in Southeast Asia, according to the Korean Institute of Criminology, based on surveys conducted in Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand and the Philippines.

“If the testimony from many underage prostitutes, police officers and human rights groups is true, South Koreans are the biggest customers of the child sex industry in the region,” their report stated, reported the Korea Times newspaper.

“That’s very shameful for [South Korea].”

Yun Hee-jun, a Seoul-based anti-sex trafficker, told the Times: “On online community websites, you can easily find information about prices for sex with minors and the best places to go. If you visit any brothel in Vietnam or Cambodia, you can see …  fliers written in Korean.”

The U.S. State Department, in the 2008 “Trafficking in Persons Report,” also blamed South Korean tourists for significantly driving the demand for underage sex in Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands.

The document indicated that large numbers of South Korean girls and women have been trafficked to Japan, the U.S. and as far away as Western Europe.

On the flip side, many women from poorer Asian countries, particularly the Philippines, flock to South Korea to work as prostitutes and "bar girls" (lured by the promises of legitimate work as waitresses or entertainers).

For the record, the U.S. government prohibits American servicemen from patronizing bars and other establishments in South Korea served by prostitutes.

Blogger Park Je-Sun wrote on Threewisemonkeys that in Seoul, South Korea’s largest city, prostitution is widespread and peculiarly civilized -- and a central component of the local business culture.

“The majority of top-end -- that is, rich -- businessmen in Seoul are more familiar with sex-industry culture than in a number of other countries,” Park wrote.

“Sex and power are closely linked in this city.”

As an illustration of how widespread prostitution is in South Korea, consider that in January 2012 police raided a nine-story brothel in the upscale Gangnam neighborhood in Seoul and discovered no less than 100 prostitutes working there, ostensibly as "hostesses," who charged at least $300 for sex. This complex generated more than $200,000 every day, according to local media reports.

“It’s not uncommon for a hostess bar and a hotel to be located in the same building,” a policeman told the Korea Times.

In late 2006, the South Korean government took an unusual step to stamp out prostitution -- the Ministry for Gender Equality offered a cash incentive to companies whose male employees refrained from buying sex at office parties and business trips, an ingrained part of Korean corporate culture.

The prevalence of prostitution in contemporary South Korea provides an ironic counterpoint to the passionate political activism of elderly Korean women who relentlessly criticize Japan for forcing them into servitude as prostitutes and "comfort women" during Tokyo’s brutal occupation of their country.

Prostitution has a long history in South Korea, going back to the medieval period, when the “kisaeng,” female entertainers, were officially sanctioned by the ruling elite to perform all kinds of services, including sex.

Prostitution as a way of life continued in one form or another over the centuries, including during Japan’s occupation of Korea in the first half of the 20th century.

After World War II and the Korean War, the United States changed the face of prostitution.

Park Chung-hee, who ruled the country for most of the 1960s and 1970s, actually encouraged the sex trade in order to generate much-needed revenue, particularly at the expense of the thousands of U.S. troops stationed in the country.

“Our government was one big pimp for the U.S. military,” Kim Ae-ran, a former South Korean prostitute forced to work at an American military base, told the International Herald Tribune.

“They urged us to sell as much as possible to the G.I.’s, praising us as ‘dollar-earning patriots.'”

Another ex-prostitute lamented: “The more I think about my life, the more I think women like me were the biggest sacrifice for my country’s alliance with the Americans. Looking back, I think my body was not mine but the [South Korean] government’s and the U.S. military’s.”

In the 21st century, another source of prostitution comes from South Korea’s impoverished northern neighbor, North Korea.

Female defectors from North Korea – who typically reach South Korea after an arduous journey through a third country -- also sometimes descend into prostitution to survive.

Reportedly, many female North Korean defectors are forced into prostitution, not only to pay the exorbitant fees charged by people-smugglers, but to earn a living in South Korea -- sometimes this scenario leads to tragic consequences.

In March 2013, South Korean media reported on the case of a North Korean woman who was murdered while toiling as a sex worker in the city of Hwaseong, southwest of Seoul.

The killer, who turned himself in to police, confessed that he strangled the woman to death in a fit of anger when she refused to perform a “perverted” sex act. Compounding this tragedy of a desperate woman who fled repression and starvation in North Korea, it later emerged that her killer had no fewer than 16 previous convictions on his lengthy criminal record.

Now, in 2013, Korean courts are reportedly considering the constitutionality of the 2004 Special Law on Prostitution, which increased the penalties for both prostitution and pimping.

“It will be of great interest to see how the Special Law plays out in the courts and in the media,” wrote the blog, idleworship.net.

“It’s a $13 billion a year reality … and it’s not going anywhere.”

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Panda delivery

I have heard that there's the panda delivery service for home party over there
called Panda easy delivery. Is that true?