We urge the IAC of UNESCO to stand up against Japan’s bullying and accept the “Comfort Women” documents in the Memory of the World Register.
Memory of the World Programme is an international initiative that would safeguard the documentary heritage of humanity against collective amnesia, neglect, the ravages of time and climatic conditions, and willful and deliberate erasure and destruction.
The “Comfort Women” are women and girls from more than a dozen Asian and European countries who were conscripted by the Japanese Imperial Armed Forces during 1930s and WWII as sex slaves for the Japanese soldiers.
In 2016, the International Committee for Joint Nominations consisting of civic groups from China, Taiwan, Korea, Holland, Philippines, E. Timor, Indonesia, and Japan, along with the British Imperial War Museum in London submitted the “Comfort Women dossier” under the name “Voices of the ‘Comfort Women.’” It consisted of 2,744 cases detailing the atrocities committed by Japanese Imperialists.
Japan is using all its power to exclude the “Comfort Women” documents. Fairness demands good faith action on the part of UNESCO. UNESCO must not succumb to Japan’s bullying and delaying tactics.
UNESCO will decide in 2019. We, the supporters of historical truth and justice in the United States, demand IAC of UNESCO to act in good faith. We demand the “Comfort Women” dossier under the name “Voices of the Comfort Women” be included into the Memory of Record Programme of UNESCO.
The “Comfort Women” survivors cannot wait any longer. The world cannot wait any longer.
