COMFORT WOMEN: KEEPING IT LOW KEY

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 TOKYO 001215

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/18/2017
TAGS: PGOV PREL JA
SUBJECT: COMFORT WOMEN: KEEPING IT LOW KEY


Classified By: AMBASSADOR J. THOMAS SCHIEFFER. REASONS 1.4 (B),(D).


1. (C) Summary. Prime Minister Abe and Liberal Democratic
Party (LDP) leaders appear to have made a conscious decision
to lower the volume on the comfort women issue, judging by a
sharp decrease in the number of public statements on the
subject over the past week. Abe demonstrated this restraint
during a March 19 Diet session, when he responded to a
question saying only: "I adhere to the Kono Statement."
This may not reflect a change in thinking by Abe and other
conservatives, but a more realistic understanding of the
international outcry over Abe's earlier attempts to distance
Japan from responsibility for its wartime acts. Concern over
the possible disruptive effects of the controversy on
upcoming summits with President Bush and Chinese Premier Wen
Jiabao appears to be the driving force behind this new public
stance. How Abe and the LDP will handle the issue
post-summit remains an open question. End summary.


2. (C) Over the past week, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and at
least some of his top aides in the Liberal Democratic Party
(LDP) seem to have pulled back on publicly questioning the
historical basis for the 1993 Kono Statement. In fact, they
have largely refrained from making comments of any kind
concerning the comfort women issue. In a Sunday talk show
appearance on March 11, Abe stood by the Kono Statement,
saying his "feelings" toward the comfort women were no
different than those expressed by former Prime Ministers
Koizumi and Hashimoto in their letters of apology. He told
the Diet press corps on March 12: "I think we naturally
share the feelings of apology for those who at the time
suffered immeasurable psychological wounds." LDP Secretary
General Hidenao Nakagawa told reporters that same week: "The
right thing to do is to let experts and historians take the
lead ... It should not be discussed as an issue in the realm
of politics or foreign affairs." LDP General Affairs Council
Chair Yuya Niwa has said, "there is no need for the party to
conduct an investigation right away," and cautioned against
politicizing the issue. Speaker of the Lower House, Yohei
Kono, in his first public remarks on the controversy
surrounding his 1993 statement, told reporters, "I issued it
with conviction. I hope people will take it as it is."


3. (C) Following a very heated March 13 debate at the Prime
Minister's offices, Nariaki Nakayama, leader of the
right-wing "Committee of LDP Lawmakers to Consider Japan's
Future and Historical Education," agreed to postpone plans by
his group to reexamine the comfort women issue. According to
an Embassy Tokyo contact present during that meeting,
Nakayama initially called for the Abe administration to
launch a government-sponsored inquiry. LDP policy chief
Shoichi Nakagawa argued that the LDP should take the lead.
Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Hakubun Shimomura, speaking
for Abe, convinced Nakayama to postpone the research until
after summits with China and the United States, repeating
Abe's pledge to provide the LDP group with historical
documents from government archives. In the end, no final
agreement was reached on whether the LDP or the government
would eventually conduct the historical study, but Shimomura
and Nakagawa left open the possibility that the government
could still convene a task force to reexamine the comfort
women issue at an appropriate time.


4. (C) The issue percolated back into the media on March 16
when Abe's office provided a written reply -- much like a
Congressional "Question for the Record" -- to an earlier Diet
inquiry from an opposition Social Democratic Party (SDP)
member. The response repeats earlier assertions that the
government had discovered no evidence of direct Japanese
military coercion of comfort women. It also makes the point
that the Kono Statement was never adopted by a formal cabinet
decision, which is true. At the same it notes that
successive cabinets have upheld the Kono Statement, and that
there are no plans to take up a formal cabinet decision on
the subject. The "QFR" received relatively little coverage
in Japan, probably because it merely restated the
government's previous position.


5. (C) On March 19, Social Democratic Party leader Mizuho
Fukushima followed up in a Lower House Budget Committee

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hearing by pressing Abe further. She asked him if, when he
says he stands by the Kono Statement, he also includes the
portions that say some of the comfort women were "taken
against their will," with the involvement of government
authorities. Abe answered simply: "As I said last year in
the Diet, I adhere to the Kono Statement."


6. (C) The deliberately cautious approach displayed by Abe
in recent days is likely due to greater sensitivity toward
April summits with China and the United States. Whether he
has the intent or the political will and clout to shelve the
comfort women issue permanently is a separate matter. Some
political commentators here suggest that Abe will use the
issue after the summits to pander to his conservative base in
hopes of rallying support for himself and the LDP in what are
expected to be difficult Upper House elections in July. We,
however, agree with those Embassy contacts who argue that
Abe, as a founding member in 1997 of Nakayama's LDP history
committee, has no need to burnish his nationalist
credentials. Rather, his statements questioning the
historical basis of the Kono Statement simply express his
real opinion.


7. (C) Embassy Tokyo has consistently expressed one theme to
its Japanese contacts -- arguing that the Japanese military
did not technically coerce the comfort women into
prostitution is a losing proposition that will only hurt
Japan's reputation in America. Praise by Ambassador
Schieffer and visiting Australian Prime Minister Howard for
Abe's March 11 expression of regret to comfort women victims
and his renewed commitment to stand by the Kono Statement
were featured prominently in the Japanese media, and seem to
have been well received by the Japanese public. The
Ambassador's March 16 remarks decrying the treatment of the
comfort women and calling the evidence of coercion
"self-evident" also received wide coverage.


8. (C) Comment. Regardless of his own personal beliefs, Abe
and at least some of his top aides seem to recognize that
there is much to lose diplomatically by continuing to
question the basis for the Kono Statement in advance of the
China and U.S. summits. Whether Abe is able to maintain
control of the more conservative elements of the LDP after
his return from Washington is less certain. Efforts by a
committee of conservative LDP lawmakers to reexamine the
historical record are likely to resume soon after Abe's
summit with the President, according to one member of the
panel. If Abe cooperates with that investigation by
providing the group with official records, as he has promised
to do, or continues to strongly deny official involvement in
coercion of sex slaves, it would be a disturbing indication
that he is willing to isolate Japan internationally in
furtherance of a conservative, nationalist agenda.
SCHIEFFER