Japan military involved in WWII mass suicides: court

JCFalkenbergIII · #1 (**permalink**) March 28th, 2008, 04:29 PM

Japan military involved in WWII mass suicides: court

Mr Oe, now 73, is known for his pacifist views and staunch backing of the post-war constitution, which says Japan will never again wage war. -- PHOTO: AP

TOKYO - A COURT on Friday ruled the Japanese military had a role in wartime mass suicides in Okinawa, rejecting a libel suit by former senior officers against Nobel laureate Kenzaburo Oe.
The closely watched lawsuit was filed against Mr Oe and the publisher of his 1970 book of essays Okinawa Notes, which mentioned how Japanese troops in the southern island chain ordered people to kill themselves in 1945 rather than surrender to US invaders.
'It is recognised that the military was deeply involved in the mass suicides,' presiding judge Toshimasa Fukami ruled at the the Osaka District Court, as quoted by local media.
The suit, filed in August 2005, was one reason cited by the central government last year for its controversial decision to change school textbooks to delete references to the military forcing islanders to commit suicides.
Conservatives have led calls for Japan to break post-World War II taboos against 'patriotism'.
Just Friday, the government revised education guidelines to require schools to teach students to sing the national anthem.
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TOKYO - THE Japanese government has urged schools to foster patriotism, including making sure primary school students can sing the national anthem, in new guidelines.

The new rules come into line with Japan's basic law on education, which was revised in December 2006 under conservative former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to place greater emphasis on love of country.

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The 83-day Battle of Okinawa, the bloodiest in the Pacific war, left 190,000 Japanese dead, half of them civilians on the southern island chain.
While many perished in the all-out US bombardment, local accounts say mainland Japanese troops forced residents of Okinawa - an independent kingdom until the 19th century - to commit suicide rather than surrender.
The judge supported Mr Oe's book, noting that many local residents say that soldiers gave them grenades to kill themselves and that no suicide pacts were seen in places where the military was not stationed.
The court rejected a 20-million-yen (S$276,284) damage suit by a 91-year-old former garrison commander in Okinawa and the family of another late commander.
The court also turned down their demand that the book's publication be suspended, a court official said.
The plaintiffs argued they had not ordered local civilians to kill themselves and that the suicides were voluntary.
The pair were 'disappointed with the very regrettable ruling', their lawyer said, adding they would appeal to a higher court.
Mr Oe had referred to garrison commanders on two of Okinawa's islands without naming them.
He said on Friday that he did not intend to denigrate the two men on an individual level.
'The presiding judge read my Okinawa Notes correctly in issuing the ruling. It made a most strong impression on me,' Mr Oe told a nationally televised press conference in Osaka.
Mr Oe, now 73, won the Nobel prize for literature in 1994. He is known for his pacifist views and staunch backing of the post-war constitution, which says Japan will never again wage war.
Mr Oe argued that the lawsuit was the work of 'large political drift' towards a more nationalistic Japan.
'This drift intends to develop a mindset so as to become capable of waging war,' Mr Oe said.
The central government deleted the reference to the military involvement in textbook screening under nationalist prime minister Shinzo Abe, arguing that it was a point of contention rather than indisputable fact.
The move sparked off furious protests in Okinawa, including one of the island chain's biggest rallies in memory, surpassing attendance of most demonstrations against the heavy US military presence.
Mr Abe stepped down in September.
Under pressure, the education ministry in December restored references in history textbooks to note that Okinawans 'committed group suicides with the involvement by the Japanese military.' -- AFP

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JCFalkenbergIII · #2 (**permalink**) April 3rd, 2008, 12:47 AM

Japanese veterans appeal ruling rejecting their claim against novelist over WWII suicides

By MARI YAMAGUCHI,Associated Press Writer AP - Thursday, April 3 TOKYO - Two Japanese veterans on Wednesday appealed a court ruling denying their claim that Nobel laureate Kenzaburo Oe erroneously accused Japanese soldiers of forcing Okinawan civilians to commit suicide at the end of World War II, their lawyer said.
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Plaintiffs Yutaka Umezawa, 91, and Hidekatsu Akamatsu, 71, filed their appeal at the Osaka Higher Court, lawyer Shinichi Tokunaga said.
Last Friday, the Osaka district court acknowledged the military's responsibility in ordering the suicides, rejecting the plaintiffs' demand for 20 million yen (US$200,000; ?127,000) in compensation from Oe and the publisher of the decades-old book in which he made the claim.
The topic is a sensitive issue on the southern islands of Okinawa, where battles raged from late March through June 1945, leaving more than 200,000 civilians and soldiers dead and speeding Japan's defeat. The United States occupied Okinawa until 1972.
In his book "Okinawa Notes," Oe chronicled accounts of group suicides on Okinawa, alleging that Japanese soldiers coerced civilians to kill themselves rather than surrender to the invading U.S. troops.
Historians generally agree that hundreds of Okinawan civilians killed themselves under such circumstances, backed by abundant testimony from survivors and their relatives.
"The ruling was unjust both in legal interpretation and factual findings," Tokunaga said in a statement. "It is obvious that the judge wrote the ruling with bias."
Oe, who won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1994, was resolute.
"I resist any beautification of the tragedy that portrays the group suicide as a patriotic sacrifice and glorious deaths," he said in a statement after the appeal.
The plaintiffs filed the suit in 2005 amid a movement, largely backed by ruling conservatives, to discredit or censure materials documenting Japanese wartime brutality, including government-supported prostitution, the massacre of civilians in the Chinese city of Nanjing and other incidents.
The filing of the suit also prompted a government decision two years ago to delete textbook references to any military role in the forced suicides, bringing the issue to a boil in Okinawa, which culminated in a protest by more than 100,000 people in September last year.
Accused of trying to whitewash Japan's wartime history, the Education Ministry soon afterward agreed to restore to textbooks accounts of military involvement in the suicides.

Japanese veterans appeal ruling rejecting their claim against novelist over WWII suicides - Yahoo! Malaysia News

Twitch · #3 (**permalink**) April 3rd, 2008, 03:16 PM

It seems WW II just has a never-ending wealth of bizarre stories.