Originally published: December 4, 2016.
Republished: January 31, 2026.
A detailed record and critical examination by Bulgarian-born freelance journalist Miroslav Marinov of a panel discussion on the comfort women issue held at the University of Toronto’s OISE.
It exposes what Marinov describes as anti-Japanese propaganda, the reality of an academic environment dominated by left-wing ideology, and the fact that there are indeed genuine people in the world who confront such claims with facts and reason.
Originally published on December 4, 2016.
This is a detailed record and critical examination by Bulgarian-born freelance journalist Miroslav Marinov of a panel discussion on the comfort women issue held at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto, OISE.
It reveals the reality of persistent anti-Japanese propaganda, the state of an academic environment dominated by left-wing ideology, and the existence, beyond any doubt, of genuine human beings who confront such things with facts and reason.
At the same time, this article teaches us that there are always genuine people—people who stand for what is right—in this world.
December 4, 2016
While searching the Internet—the largest library in human history—to confirm the spelling of Miroslav Marinov’s name, I came across the following truly valuable article of his.
Why do I call it truly valuable?
Because media organizations such as the Asahi Shimbun never report the reality of the propaganda campaigns being waged, with the United States as their principal battleground, by South Korea and China—countries that continue to engage relentlessly in anti-Japanese propaganda of this kind.
Why do they never report it?
The Japanese people who read those media should understand the correctness of what I have long said: that these media organizations themselves have long since become targets of influence operations by the countries mentioned above and have, in all likelihood, been co-opted by them.
At the same time, this article teaches us that there are always genuine people—people who stand for what is right—in this world.
Every Japanese citizen should also realize that we owe Miroslav Marinov a profound debt of gratitude.
All emphasis within the text, other than the title, is mine.
Panel Discussion on the Comfort Women Issue—At the University of Toronto’s OISE
Miroslav Marinov
On May 3, 2016, a symposium entitled “The Apology: Colonial and Militarized Sexual Violence Against Women” was held at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto (OISE).
The event was organized by the Centre for Women’s Studies in Education of OISE/UT, ALPHA Education (Toronto ALPHA), the Centre for the Study of Korea (UT), and others.
The panelists were Tiffany Hsuing, director of The Apology, a film critical of the Japanese government’s handling of the comfort women issue; Gil Won OK, a former comfort woman; Yoon Meehyang, Standing Representative of the Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan; Judy Cho, Program Director of Toronto ALPHA, who participated on this occasion as an interpreter; Yanar Mohammed, an Iraqi-born Canadian feminist activist and head of the Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq; and Winnie Muchuba, originally from the Congo and herself a survivor of violence, representing Romero House and the Parkdale Community Health Center.
The moderator was Angela Lytle, a pro-Korean feminist activist at OISE.
I would like to make two points here.
First, OISE is an educational institution that instills far-left ideology in its students, and many of its instructors openly declare themselves to be Marxists.
They are deeply hostile toward developed countries, including Canada, and argue that the development of advanced nations is nothing more than the result of colonial exploitation.
For example, at almost every event held at the University of Toronto, far-left instructors—Lytle being no exception—and moderators say things such as:
“We are standing on land that belongs to Indigenous people. This land remains colonized even today.”
In reality, the truth is that Indigenous people sold their land long ago, but facts do not matter to these leftists because their objective is to denigrate Canada as a nation.
Taking up the “comfort women” issue at this panel discussion was likewise an attempt to denigrate Japan unjustly.
The second point I would like to make is that the organizers incorporated present-day issues into their discussion of the comfort women, which is an issue concerning events of the past.
Yanar Mohammed, the Iraqi-born panelist, spoke about women being abducted by local residents and Americans, raped, and sold into slavery after the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq.
Winnie Muchuba, meanwhile, spoke about the effects of war on women in her native Congo.
(In both Iraq and the Congo, the suffering of women was caused by civil conflict and had nothing to do with colonial policy.)
Discussions of this kind create the image that Japan is as terrible a country as Iraq or the Congo, places where law and order have collapsed.
In their respective presentations, both Tiffany Hsuing and Yoon Meehyang emphasized the claim that the Japanese military abducted as many as 200,000 Korean women and that the testimony of wartime victims is of paramount importance.
Their arguments were as follows.
Abducted Korean women, together with women of other nationalities, were turned into sex slaves in countries occupied by Japan.
Because they were deeply ashamed of having suffered sexual assault, it took them many years before they could reveal the truth.
Organizations supporting former comfort women have so far identified 500 survivors, although most of the women either have uncertain memories or wish to forget the past.
Several of the cases presented by Yoon Meehyang were truly strange.
Gil Won OK, who attended as a panelist, was said to have been abducted at the age of thirteen, but because her age had been counted according to the Korean lunar-year system, she was supposedly actually eleven years old.
Another comfort woman cited by Yoon Meehyang was said to have been a fifteen-year-old girl at the time.
She was supposedly so exhausted every day that she had to be given injections.
When this woman appeared before Yoon Meehyang in 1995, Yoon claimed that needle marks were still visible on her body.
(This story is exceedingly difficult to accept. Could marks from injection needles used in the 1930s really have remained visible until 1995?)
Yoon Meehyang also made the following claims.
During the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, many women in the disaster-stricken areas were raped.
The Korean Council sent packages containing underwear to victims in the affected areas, together with $50,000 and messages from former comfort women.
The Korean Council is also pursuing the issue of rape committed by soldiers dispatched to the Vietnam War.
Prime Minister Abe refuses to face the truth because his grandfather was a war criminal.
The apology contained in the December 2015 Japan–South Korea agreement was insufficient.
Japan should admit all of its crimes in full and provide monetary compensation to the former comfort women.
Japan should adopt textbooks that include the crimes Japan committed.
After the presentation, I asked Yoon Meehyang what evidence supported her assertion that the stories concerning the comfort women were true.
I also asked about the alleged rapes following the Great East Japan Earthquake, since no media organization had reported them.
Regarding her claim that the comfort women accounts were true, Yoon replied that it was based on the description contained in MacArthur’s 1945 report, “Amenities in the Japanese Armed Forces.”
As for the alleged rapes following the Great East Japan Earthquake, she said the information had come from a Japanese women’s organization.
After my question, a friend of mine asked a further question concerning the ages of the comfort women.
Citing a book she had with her, my friend pointed out that the women had been paid wages and that their ages were given as between seventeen and thirty.
She therefore asked whether it was not extremely unlikely that an eleven-year-old girl would have been recruited.
Yoon Meehyang’s reaction clearly demonstrated that left-wing feminists dislike rational questions.
Her facial expression showed obvious irritation, and she simply insisted that the testimony of victims was more important than the contents of the book.
Moderator Angela Lytle criticized my friend for asking a perfectly reasonable question.
She said, in substance:
“This is a ‘political safe space’ in which victims are respected and their activism is celebrated. This is not a place to question that respect or to question the celebration of their activities. The questioner is trying to disrupt this event.”
Yanar Mohammed nodded in agreement with Lytle’s comments.
Later in the event, Mohammed commented that those who call victims’ voices lies are “state feminists” who speak for governments and attack their beliefs.
Although she did not refer to my friend directly, her comment was clearly a criticism of my friend’s entirely reasonable question.
This is the level of academic discussion in Canada at an educational institution dominated by left-wing fanatics.
What makes it extremely difficult to debate such fanatics is that they refuse to accept the existence of obvious facts that contradict their agenda.
For the left, the foundations of debate are emotion and personal attack.
And because the left pushes its ideas and opinions so forcefully, politicians are left with the impression that such fanatics possess substantial influence.
After the lecture, I searched the Internet for the MacArthur report.
What I discovered was that the report did not prove the existence of sexual slavery at all.
There may be an argument that wartime comfort stations were morally objectionable, but the comfort women were by no means slaves.
The comfort women were paid money, and the Japanese military encouraged them to save their earnings.
If the Korean Council attaches such importance to the MacArthur report, it is strange that Japan does not use that same report to support Japan’s own position.
Finally, I would like to make a proposal concerning the panelists’ claim that 200,000 women were abducted.
Would it not be possible, by pursuing the claim of 200,000 abductions more rigorously, to demonstrate the falsity of the allegation that the Japanese military abducted 200,000 women?
If the South Korean government insists that 200,000 women were abducted, the Japanese government should demand a list of those women, including their personal histories.
May 16, 2016
References
Amenities in the Japanese Armed Forces
I.G. No. 6310
B.I.D. No. 1228
DATE OF ISSUE: 15 November 1945
MacArthur Document Reports Imperial Japanese Military’s “Sanction” of Comfort Women Brothels
By Dennis Halpin
US-KOREA INSTITUTE AT SAIS
August 15, 2013
About the Author: Miroslav Marinov
Miroslav Marinov is a Canada-based writer and freelance journalist originally from Bulgaria.
After graduating from the Department of Philosophy at Sofia University, he completed doctoral studies at the Institute of Philosophy of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.
His writing focuses primarily on North American politics.
Recent book: Lynched: The Media War against Rob Ford