“Comfort Women Issue: From Misunderstandings to Solution (慰安婦問題 誤解から解決に向けて)” is the title of a 2016 booklet published in both English and Japanese by Nadeshiko Action authored by Yumiko Yamamoto and Kiyoshi Hosoya and translated (badly) by Kiyoshi Hosoya and Sharon Isac.
The booklet starts with a revisionist overview of Japanese history which claims that “Japan is classless society. We have no history of slavery. We have very little sense of discrimination. We treat people at disadvantage with compassion and warmth, as did the Japanese military during WWII.” It reproduces the same old denier arguments that have been thoroughly debunked decades ago.
Hosoya and Yamamoto have been distributing copies of this booklet at the UN Commission on the Status of Women NGO Parallel Events (2016) and elsewhere.
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.
In 2016, Japanese right-wing groups infiltrated the NGO Parallel Events by submitting innocuous-looking proposals to the organizers of NGO Parallel Events with the goal of promoting comfort women denial and Japanese nationalism. Two such events were held.
March 16, 2016 – “Misunderstood Comfort Women”
On March 16th, denier group Global Alliance for Historical Truth presented a panel titled “Misunderstood Comfort Women” which denied the history of comfort women. The panel was facilitated by Terumi Imamura and speakers were Koichi Mera, Kiyoshi Hosoya, and Mio Sugita.
March 24, 2016 – “Women’s Rights under Armed Conflict: Japan’s Approach to Respect Women”
Denier group Nadeshiko Action (Japanese Women for Justice and Peace) sponsored a panel titled “Women’s Rights under Armed Conflict: Japan’s Approach to Respect Women” on March 24th. The panel was facilitated by Shizuko Culpepper and speakers included Yumiko Yamamoto, Koichi Mera, Sharon Isac, Kaoli Koyasu, Mieko Green, and Charlotte Meyer.
Happy Science (acting as “True Japan”) hosted two Japanese-language panels in California in December 2014 featuring notorious comfort women deniers Yumiko Yamamoto, Mitsuhiko Fujii, and others.
The San Francisco event took place on December 13, 2014 in Redwood City, California (where Happy Science’s San Francisco temple is located). The event was protested by a coalition of Asian, labor, and peace activists from the Bay Area. Speakers included:
The Los Angeles event held on December 14, 2014 in Torrance, California included the following speakers:
Nadeshiko Action (“Japanese Women for Justice and Peace,” なでしこアクション), also spelled Nadesiko Action, is a comfort women denier group founded by Yumiko Yamamoto, the former secretary general and vice president of the extremist anti-Korean group Zaitokukai. Nadeshiko Action mobilizes campaigns against the movement for comfort women redress outside of Japan by coordinating with Japanese residents in the U.S., Australia, Canada, and other countries.
Nadeshiko Action is also the source of the massive wave of form letters and petitions sent to municipalities that have considered a resolution or other action on comfort women issue. As part of the Alliance for Truth about Comfort Women, Nadeshiko Action has actively participated in its lobbying efforts at the United Nations level, holding meetings at the UN Commission on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).
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Website: http://nadesiko-action.org (Japanese)
Yumiko Yamamoto (山本優美子) is the former vice president and secretary general of far-right racist group Zaitokukai (在特会) and the founder of comfort women denier group Nadeshiko Action (なでしこアクション) which calls itself “Japanese Women for Justice and Peace.”
Yamamoto left Zaitokukai in late 2011 (according to her) or early 2012 (according to Zaitokukai press release) after members of her group have been prosecuted for violent assaults on Korean elementary school and other targets. In her book “Josei ga mamoru nihon no hokori (女性が守る日本の誇り)” published in 2014, Yamomoto explains that the reason for leaving the organization was not because of any disagreement with its activities, but because she felt confident that the organization had grown strong enough that she could focus her effort on comfort women denial.
Yamamoto is a board member of Global Alliance for Historical Truth (GAHT) and a key member of Alliance for Truth About Comfort Women.
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