CERD concerned over Japan's racist statements, actions prevalence  

联合国消除种族歧视委员会对日本种族歧视提出关切

The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) has voiced concerns over prevalence of racist statements and actions in Japan during a two-day review that concluded Thursday.

Completing its consideration of periodic report of Japan on its implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, CERD raised concerns over issues of racial discrimination in the country.

During the two-day review, the committee, a body of independent experts that monitors implementation of the Convention by its state parties, drew attention to the prevalence of racist statements and actions in Japan, noting that over 360 cases of racist demonstrations and speeches occurred in the Asian country since 2013.

The committee questioned what actions was Japan taking to curb hate speeches, stressing that "it was sometimes necessary to confront and punish wrong-doers".

An expert noted that "there was a serious problem of racial discrimination in Japan," saying that some extreme right organizations and individuals used the newspapers, Internet, TV and other media to spread their racist hate speech, degraded, harassed and provoked foreigners wantonly and sometimes even perpetrated violent acts against them.

The expert also stressed that those extreme right groups held demonstrations, even flying Japanese military flags used during the Second World War (WWII) in order to revive militarism.

However, such groups went unpunished by the authorities, and became increasingly wanton in their practices, leaving their victims with no access to justice because the authorities turned a deaf ear to their complaints, according to the expert.

Moreover, some senior Japanese politicians, including cabinet ministers, had made racist statements which sought to mislead Japanese people and distort history, and spread the so-called "theory of China threat", partially due to the lack of a special law against discrimination and absence of a national human rights institution, as highlighted by the expert.

Another expert slammed the issue of sexual slavery, known as "comfort women" dating back to WWII, as "an ongoing violation" against human rights, criticizing the Japanese government's denial on the victim status of those women.

The expert stressed that Japanese government refused to recognize the victims as sex slaves, but asserted they were wartime prostitutes, which "caused untold agony for those women."

"They and their families deserved recognition of their victim status and reparations," the expert said.

In addition, an expert also raised concerns over the reports of systematic surveillance of Muslims in Japan and its continued racial discrimination against Koreans in Japan, including explicit racist statements and actions against children attending Korean schools.

The expert insisted that the withdrawal of tuition support to Korean schools in Japan "was not only a major concern in depriving many children from adequate education, but a symbol of wider discrimination."

In concluding remarks, the committee required Japan to adopt a comprehensive anti-discrimination law to plug the gaps in its domestic legislation, to tackle racist hate speech without impeding upon the right to free speech, to immediately install a national human rights institution, and to improve its protection of rights of Korean, Chinese and Muslim minority groups in the country.