This chapter examines who introduced the term “sex slave” and how it entered international discourse through the 1996 UN submission known as the Kumaraswamy Report.
It traces the role of NGO activism at the United Nations Commission on Human Rights and exposes how a misleading term reshaped global perceptions of Japan.

2016-07-03

What follows is a continuation of “Meanwhile, on television and elsewhere, footage of Yoshida’s testimony continued to be broadcast uncritically.”
Emphasis in the text other than the heading is mine.
“Sex slave” is a complete fabrication.
At the same time, there was also a major lapse in vigilance.
During this period, I had never imagined that such a gross misunderstanding—that “Japan forcibly abducted Korean women and turned them into sex slaves”—had spread so widely throughout the international community.
As is well known, the catalyst for the spread of the term “sex slave” was the “Kumaraswamy Report” submitted in 1996 to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (now the Human Rights Council).
So who was it that first used the term “sex slave”?
This too I first reported in Seiron (May 2012 issue), and upon investigation it turned out to be a Japanese lawyer named Etsuro Totsuka.
For details, please refer to the explanation of the Japanese government’s “phantom rebuttal document” to the Kumaraswamy Report in this special supplement (p.380).
Between 1992, when we were engaged in intense debate within Japan, and 1996, when the Kumaraswamy Report was issued, Attorney Totsuka visited the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in Geneva at a pace of roughly once every three months, bringing with him the term “sex slave.”
Unlike the United Nations headquarters in New York, which is a stage for intergovernmental diplomacy, the Commission on Human Rights in Geneva grants NGOs the right to speak, and meetings between NGOs and diplomats are held frequently.
Ms. Kumaraswamy of Sri Lanka, appointed as Special Rapporteur (investigator) on the comfort women issue, was neither a specialist on Japan nor on Korean history.
With nothing but English-language materials to rely on, she was being supplied with documents by NGOs gathering in Geneva.
Needless to say, these were forces intent on condemning Japan over the comfort women issue.
A look at the report makes it clear how lacking in credibility these materials were (see this special supplement, “The Japanese Government’s ‘Phantom Rebuttal’ to the UN Kumaraswamy Report,” p.362).
To be continued.