Civic groups ask UNESCO to list comfort women records

By Kim Hyo-jin

An alliance of civic groups from eight countries has asked UNESCO to list records of Japan’s war-time sexual enslavement of women on its Memory of the World Register.

The international joint committee said that it submitted an application to list a collection of 2,744 records of the crime to UNESCO, Tuesday.

The committee was formed in May last year to seek UNESCO recognition for the records concerning Japan’s wartime sex slavery.

The committee represents 14 civic groups from eight nations including South Korea, China, Japan and the Netherlands.

“We applied to register the documentary records with UNESCO to commemorate the sex slavery victims,” the committee said in a release.

The documentary records include photos and tapes that recorded the victims’ statements, their treatment and the investigation process.

UNESCO is expected to make a final decision on whether to include the records sometime in October.

Shin Hye-soo, former head of the Korean council for the women drafted into military sexual slavery by Japan, said, “UNESCO informed us that these records comprise the largest volume in UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register.”

The register is a UNESCO program aimed at preserving and administering collections of historically valuable records, including documents, books, letters, photos and videos.

The Chinese government recently expressed its support for the joint civic group.

China had submitted documents on the wartime sexual slavery activities of Japan and the 1937 massacre in Nanjing for world heritage status.

But only the documents about the Nanjing massacre committed by Japanese soldiers won UNESCO approval in October 2015.

In response, Japan requested that UNESCO review its screening procedure, insisting that the world heritage list is being abused for political purposes.

Observers view that it was a preemptive move to prevent possible listing of documentary records concerning the comfort women.