Japan Urged by U.S. House to Apologize for Wartime Sex Slavery

いあん　慰安

日頃の労をねぎらって楽しませること。
「―旅行」

((seek)) consolation ((in)); ((give)) comfort ((to)).
慰安会　a recreation party.
慰安旅行　a recreation trip.
従軍慰安婦　a military comfort woman; a woman forced to provide sexual services to soldiers.

三省堂提供「EXCEED 和英辞典

米下院、従軍慰安婦問題で決議採択

　【ワシントン＝丸谷浩史】米下院本会議は30日午後（日本時間31日早朝）、旧日本軍によるいわゆる従軍慰安婦問題で日本政府に公式に謝罪を求め る決議案を可決した。本会議での可決は初めて。法的拘束力はない。ただ全下院議員の意思を表す決議だけに日米関係に微妙な影響を与え、参院選で敗北し、政 権基盤が弱まっている安倍晋三首相に打撃となることも予想される。

　決議は旧日本軍が「若い女性を『従軍慰安婦』として知られる性的奴隷」にしたと非難し、首相の声明による謝罪が望ましいとの立場を盛り込んだ。決議の採決は発声投票で実施し、出席議員から異議が出なかったため、可決した。

　決議案は今年1月末、カリフォルニア州選出のマイク・ホンダ議員が提出。安倍首相の発言などをきっかけに人権問題として米政界の関心が高 まり、共同提案者は当初の6人から、最終的には党派を超えて167人に達した。6月末には下院外交委員会が39対2の賛成多数で決議案を可決した。(10:20)

Japan Urged by U.S. House to Apologize for Wartime Sex Slavery

By Nadine Elsibai

July 30 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. House of Representatives demanded Japan officially apologize for its role in recruiting as many as 200,000 women into sexual slavery before and during World War II.

By voice vote, the House approved a resolution calling on Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, to publicly apologize.

``The government of Japan should formally acknowledge, apologize and accept historical responsibility in a clear and unequivocal manner for its Imperial Armed Force's coercion of women into sexual slavery, known to the world as `comfort women,''' the resolution says.

In 1993, then-Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono issued an apology after a two-year Japanese study concluded that the country's military was involved in forcing women to provide sexual services. The apology was never adopted by Japan's parliament.

Today's resolution ``speaks out for the victims of this monstrous system who were terrorized and brutalized by men at war,'' Representative Tom Lantos, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said on the House floor.

Abe caused controversy March 1 when he said no evidence exists to show the government and military were directly involved in the practice. He subsequently told Japan's parliament on March 26 that the government stands by the Kono apology, and he expressed sympathy for what the women went through.

`Voice' to Victims

Voters angered by government scandals handed Abe's party a major political defeat yesterday in elections for Japan's upper house. Abe said today he won't resign. ``I'm not going to just escape,'' he told a news conference.

Japanese historian Yoshimi Yoshiaki, in his 1995 book ``Comfort Women,'' estimates as many as 200,000 women from China, Korea, the Philippines, Taiwan, Indonesia and Burma served as sex slaves in 2,000 centers.

The House measure ``gives voice to these courageous women whom others have tried to silence through shame, bigotry and threats of further violence,'' Lantos said.

Representative Mike Honda, a California Democrat and chairman of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, introduced the resolution. Honda, 66, a Japanese-American, spent his early childhood in an internment camp in Colorado with his family during World War II.

A call to Japan's Embassy in Washington for comment on the House vote wasn't immediately returned.

A group of 44 Japanese lawmakers bought a full-page advertisement in the Washington Post on June 14 denying Japan's military forced the women into slavery.

Ambassador Ryozo Kato told the Kyodo news service on June 20 that the resolution isn't based on fact and passing it would be ``harmful for U.S.-Japan'' relations.

``To deny this tragedy is to allow it to happen again,'' Tom Davis, a Virginia Republican, said today.

To contact the reporter on this story: Nadine Elsibai in Washington at nelsibai@bloomberg.net