Protests Against Japan's Policies Amidst Korea's Liberation Day Celebrations

In solidarity with former Korean "comfort women" and supporters who have demonstrated in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul on every Wednesday for the past ten years to demand the Japanese government's acknowledgement and apology of its role in the wartime military sex slave system, activists in the Washington, DC area demonstrated in front of the Japanese embassy in Washington on Wednesday, August 17, 2011.

The following is their statement:

This week, Koreans throughout the globe are commemorating the 66th anniversary of Korea’s Liberation Day (August 15, 1945) from the Japanese colonialism.

The reason why we have gathered in front of the Japanese Embassy today is to show our grave concerns on the Japanese government’s continuing refusal to acknowledge its wartime crimes such as the “comfort women” (military sex slave system) issue.

Unlike the German government, the Japanese government still refuses to come to terms with the ramifications of its wartime crimes, but instead pursues teachings of revisionist history through school textbooks that whitewash its wartime atrocities inflicted on civilians of Korea, China, and other Asian countries.

Moreover, the Japanese government has recently provoked confrontations with Korea with the Dokdo Island dispute, disregarding Korea’s historic and sovereign claim to the islands. Koreans painfully remember that one of the first steps taken by Japan in colonizing Korea was to incorporate the Dokdo Islands as its own territory, as a strategic stepping stone towards its territorial ambitions in Asia.

We demand that:
1. Japanese government fully acknowledge the wartime military sex slave system and apologize to its surviving victims;
2. Japanese government stop using school textbooks that distort wartime history;
3. Japanese government issue public apology regarding its wartime crimes and set up a compensation fund to surviving victims;
4. Japanese government stop disputing Korea’s sovereignty over the Dokdo Islands.

SaSaSe-Washington (Korean Americans for Peace)
Washington Special Committee on the Dokdo Islands

"There's an app for that" for Korean Reunification

Imagine Korea without the signs of division such as fences along the DMZ. Now you can -- literally see it with your own eyes -- a smartphone user with this "augmented reality" app can point to certain locations along the DMZ viewing area and "see" the landscape without the man-made barriers that are painful signs of continuing Korean division and inter-Korean acrimony. Hopefully the time will soon come when smartphone users just can snap photos and see the landscape void of the physical remnants of the division.

August 15th: Korea's Liberation Day

August 15th is the Liberation Day in Korea, when Koreans celebrate its independence from Japanese colonialism. But since the Allied powers (mainly the US and USSR) had strong hands in liberating Korea, the end result was the "temporary" division that led to an eventual war, prolonged division and yet-unresolved tension in Korea. One of the last surviving members of Korean independence fighters said that "the true liberation of Korea would happen when the two sides of Korea reunite."

To many, the real history of Korean division is shrouded in Cold War-era mentality and narrative, especially amongst Americans whose government had been and are deeply involved with Korean affairs (for example, how many Americans know that Korea was under direct U.S. military government for three years after the "liberation"?) Some do understand it, as expressed keenly by an American expat teaching English in South Korea.