Asia Wide Campaign Against U.S. and Japanese Aggression and Domination of Asia (AWC)

JAPAN

STATEMENT

We Condemn the Successive Sexual Violence
Perpetrated by U.S. Soldiers

2008 FEBRUARY 20

Last autumn 2007, a nineteen year old woman was collectively raped in Hiroshima city by U.S. soldiers from U.S. Marine Iwakuni Air Station. Unjustly, this crime was not charged by the prosecutor. And again a 14 year old schoolgirl fell prey to sexual violence by a U.S. soldier in Okinawa last February 10, 2008. Thirteen years have passed since U.S. servicemen collectively raped an elementary schoolgirl in Okinawa in 1995, but those crimes of sexual violence have been repeated by U.S. soldiers in Okinawa and various places of mainland Japan that host U.S. military bases. Just some years before the incident in Hiroshima, violent crimes to attack women were perpetrated by U.S. servicemen in Kanawawa, Iwakuni, and Okinawa.

We vehemently condemn a series of the sexual violence by U.S. soldiers.

Under the Japan-U.S. military alliance regime, countless number of women and children have been victimized by U.S. soldiers’ sexual violence. We condemn the successive sexual violence and demand to scrap the Japan-U.S. military alliance and to dismantle all the U.S. military bases.

Presently, the both of U.S. and Japanese governments prioritize the presence of U.S. bases over the crimes. They claim the solution is `enforcement of the official discipline’ to soldiers in order to silence people’s protest. It is obvious that their supreme concern is to push through consolidation of the military alliance and U.S. military re-alignment projects like construction of a new U.S. base in Henoko, Okinawa and reinforcement of U.S. Marine Air Station in Iwakuni, etc. We oppose their scheme and instead demand to dismantle all U.S. troops and bases.

Every time when the U.S. soldiers commit the crimes, there are some people and media who made violent remarks to point out responsibility on the side of the victims. A weekly magazine `Shincho’ (issue of February 21) criticizes the schoolgirl for her carelessness, which shits responsibility on the victimized girl and justifies the violent crime of the soldier. We never pardon the remarks of this kind. Local government, the police, and the prosecutor are also responsible very much. The governor of Hiroshima made abusive remark which suggested fault of the victim after the rape case last autumn. The police and the prosecutors of Hiroshima admitted the U.S. soldiers’ deposition that there was consent with the raped victim, and did not prosecute them without any enforcement of investigation. All of them blame the victimized woman and isolate her to get the U.S. soldiers with impunity, which only encourage soldiers to repeat the sexual violence crimes.

We never pardon those bashing attack on the victimized schoolgirl in Okinawa. We demand strict punishment on the U.S. soldier. Last February 14 the victimized woman in Hiroshima attended the preliminary hearing of the military tribunal inside U.S. Iwakuni base, and testified to the collective rape case. We resolutely stand with her. We strongly demand the culprits of soldiers be convicted in the military tribunal, the prosecutor’s non-prosecution decision be withdrawn and investigation of the case be resumed. Justice to all the victimized women!

We demand the both governments to strictly punish the culprits of sexual violence, to amend the Japan-U.S. Status of Forces Agreement, to stop the ongoing U.S. military re-alignment projects, to scrap the Japan-U.S military alliance, and to dismantle all the U.S. military bases.

AWC-Japan

February 20, 2008

Recommended article (external link):

• The ‘Rape’ of Okinawa by Chalmers Johnson, The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 5 March 2008