Japan has denounced as “utterly unacceptable” a South Korean court ruling ordering it to pay damages to women who were sexually enslaved by the Japanese military before and during the second world war.
The Seoul central district court on Friday said Japan was liable to compensate 12 women who were forced to work as so-called “comfort women”, in a ruling that is expected to inflict further damage on the countries’ already fraught ties.
Some historians say that as many as 200,000 women – mostly Koreans, but also Chinese, south-east Asians and a small number of Japanese and Europeans – were coerced or tricked into working in military brothels between 1932 and Japan’s defeat in 1945.
While some survivors of wartime sexual slavery have accepted “humanitarian” payments from the Japanese government, many others have called for formal compensation and an official apology.
Legal experts say it is unlikely that Japan will abide by the court ruling. A support group for the women said it may take legal steps to freeze Japanese government assets in South Korea if Japan refuses to compensate the women.
Japan insists that all compensation claims were settled when the countries normalised diplomatic ties in 1965, adding that the issue had been resolved “finally and irreversibly” by a 2015 agreement that has since been scrapped by Seoul.
The court ruled that each of the 12 women were entitled to 100 million won ($91,000), adding that said the bilateral agreements cited by Japan did not impact the plaintiffs’ right to seek compensation.
“It was a crime against humanity that was systematically, deliberately and extensively committed by Japan in breach of international norms,” Justice Kim Jeong-gon said.
The court said the women were the victims of sexual abuse by Japanese troops that caused bodily harm, venereal disease and unwanted pregnancies, and inflicted “big mental scars”.
“Even if it was a country’s sovereign act, state immunity cannot be applied as it was committed against our citizens on the Korean peninsula, which was illegally occupied by Japan.”
Japan, which boycotted the court proceedings, has maintained that sovereign immunity – a principle under international law that grants states immunity from the jurisdiction of foreign courts – applied in the case.
Japan’s chief cabinet secretary, Katsunobu Kato, described the verdict as “regrettable” and “unacceptable”, while the foreign ministry summoned South Korea’s ambassador to Japan, Nam Gwan-pyo, to lodge a complaint.
Nam said he would strive to prevent the ruling from having an “undesirable impact” on bilateral relations. “I emphasised that it was most important for both sides to respond in a calm, restrained manner in order to resolve the issue,” he told reporters after meeting Japan’s vice foreign minister.
Time is running out for Japan and South Korea to resolve an issue that has blighted bilateral ties since survivors first went public more than 30 years ago. Only 16 registered Korean survivors are still alive, and seven of the 12 victims have died since the suit was filed in 2013. They are now being represented by family members.
The countries – both US allies with strong trade and people-to-people ties - are also at loggerheads over compensation for wartime labourers who were forced to work in Japanese mines and factories during its 1910-45 colonial rule, and rival claims to the Takeshima/Dokdo islands.
In late 2015, the countries said they had “finally and irreversibly” resolved the comfort women issue when Japan agreed to contribute ¥1bn to a foundation to support survivors and their families, while the then prime minister, Shinzo Abe, offered his “most sincere apologies”.
But in 2018, South Korea’s president, Moon Jae-in, effectively nullified the settlement – which had been agreed under his predecessor – saying it did not reflect the wishes of the surviving women or the strength of feeling among the South Korean public.
The court in Seoul is due to rule next week on a similar case brought against Japan by another 20 women and their families.