In August 2018, Alliance for Truth about Comfort Women sent its delegation to Geneva, Switzerland to attend the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, which met to conduct the member state review of Japan over such issues as the rights of indigenous peoples, ethnic minorities, burakumin, and victims of military comfort women.
Over the last few delegations, the Alliance has expanded its mission to deny the indigenous status of Ainu and Okinawans at United Nations meetings, bringing members such as Hokkaido prefectural assembly member Masaru Onodera (小野寺まさる) and Satoru Nakamura (仲村覚) of Okinawa Policy Research Forum of Japan (日本沖縄政策研究フォーラム). During a lunch briefing at UNCERD, Nakamura gave a speech demanding the U.N. to retract the recognition of Okinawan people as an indigenous people.
The delegation included, among others:
United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) NGO Parallel Events are a series of events held around the United Nations building by non-governmental organizations from around the world working on women’s rights while the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women meets at its headquarters in New York.
Japanese right-wing groups first infiltrated the NGO Parallel Events in 2016 under innocuously named panels to promote Japanese nationalism and comfort women denial, after which they were banned from participation for an year.
When the ban expired in 2018, comfort women denier group Global Alliance for Historical Truth returned to the NGO Parallel Events with a panel titled “The Role of Women in Japan Now” on March 19, 2018. Presenters included Koichi Mera, Keiko Kawasoe, Moe Fukada (深田萌絵), and Shizuko Culpepper (カルペッパー静子).
According to Kiyoshi Hosoya of Global Alliance for Historical Truth, Kawase argued at the panel that Japanese women are not seeking gender equality or careers, but simply desire to become full-time homemakers, and the Japanese government’s policy is focused on fulfilling such wish of the vast majority of Japanese women.
Along with the panel at the NGO Parallel Event, Kawasoe held a separate lecture in Japanese on March 21, 2018 co-sponsored by Global Alliance for Historical Truth and New York Historical Issues Study Group.
In March 2018, Alliance for Truth about Comfort Women sent its delegation to Geneva, Switzerland to attend the United Nations Human Rights Council, taking advantage of the UN consultative status of the International Career Support Association.
At the UNHRC, Sharon Isac of the Alliance gave a speech calling the historical accounts of comfort women “depraved highly defamatory myth.” In addition, former member of the Parliament Takashi Tanuma (田沼隆志) simultaneously refuted the UN Special Rapporteur David Kaye’s report describing curtailing of press freedom in Japan by the government and also argued that there is a pervasive censorship of any conversations critical of China or Korea on the internet.
The delegation included, among others:
In September 2017, Alliance for Truth about Comfort Women and its affiliated groups sent its delegation to Geneva, Switzerland to attend the United Nations Human Rights Council, taking advantage of the UN consultative status of the International Career Support Association. Shunichi Fujiki spoke in a meeting about press freedom to accuse the U.N. Special Rapporteur David Kaye’s report critical of Japanese government of “bias,” while Mio Sugita attacked the government of South Korea for financing anti-Japan propaganda and “brainwashing” its citizens to foster hatred toward Japan.
In addition, the group held a side event titled “How have the United Nations’ limited resources been EXPLOITED? Stop Bashing Japan in the name of Human Rights.”
The delegation included, among others:
Himawari Japan, a group of nationalist Japanese women in New York/New Jersey area led by Yoko Nagato, is holding its second public event on July 6, 2017. The event is to be held in Japanese.
Speakers:
Also see: Comfort Women Denier Activities in the United States
In June 2017, Alliance for Truth about Comfort Women and its affiliated groups sent its delegation to Geneva, Switzerland to attend the United Nations Human Rights Council, taking advantage of the UN consultative status of the International Career Support Association. Mitsuhiko Fujii of Rompa Project (Happy Science) spoke at the meeting demanding a re-evaluation of the 1996 report by the UN Special Rapporteur Radhika Coomaraswamy.
The delegation included, among others:
On August 25, 2016, Japanese nationalist group Toronto Seiron hosted presentations by Shiro Takahashi and Shinichi Tokunaga who also spoke at Himawari Japan Lectures (2016) two days earlier. Takahashi spoke about preserving Japanese pride while living outside Japan, while Tokunaga discussed his lawsuit against Asahi Shimbun over its coverage of comfort women issues.
In September 2016, Alliance for Truth about Comfort Women sent its fourth overseas delegation to Geneva, Switzerland to attend the United Nations Human Rights Council and to meet with officials at the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in charge of the agency’s Memory of the World Register.
At the UNHRC, Nobukatsu Fujioka of Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform gave a two-minute speech, taking advantage of the UN consultative status of the International Career Support Association.
The delegation included, among others:
In addition to the formal delegation, the Alliance for Truth about Comfort Women recruited members of the public to accompany the delegation for 268,000 yens each. Paying tourists were offered opportunities to enter United Nations functions as members of the International Career Support Association.
In February 2016, Alliance for Truth about Comfort Women sent its third overseas delegation to Geneva, Switzerland to dispute the historical orthodoxy of comfort women at the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).
Prior to the meeting, eight Japanese right-wing groups submitted their opinions to the CEDAW. They are:
The “Coalition of Three Parties” is made up of Researchers of History on Modern Japan, Society for Dissemination of Historical Fact, and Nadeshiko Action.
In July 2015, Alliance for Truth about Comfort Women sent its second overseas delegation to Geneva, Switzerland to participate at the pre-session meeting of the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and to lobby at the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) against the inclusion of Nanking atrocities and comfort women in its Memory of the World Register.
Delegation member Mio Sugita successfully obtained an opportunity to speak to the CEDAW to dispute the historical orthodoxy of comfort women by using the UN consultative status of International Career Support Association, which has become a vehicle to promote Japanese historical denial at the UN level.
Delegations included:
