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UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 07 TOKYO 001000 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR E, P, EB, EAP/J, EAP/P, EAP/PD, PA 
WHITE HOUSE/NSC/NEC; JUSTICE FOR STU CHEMTOB IN ANTI-TRUST DIVISION; 
TREASURY/OASIA/IMI/JAPAN; DEPT PASS USTR/PUBLIC AFFAIRS OFFICE; 
SECDEF FOR JCS-J-5/JAPAN, 
DASD/ISA/EAPR/JAPAN; DEPT PASS ELECTRONICALLY TO USDA 
FAS/ITP FOR SCHROETER; PACOM HONOLULU FOR PUBLIC DIPLOMACY ADVISOR; 
CINCPAC FLT/PA/ COMNAVFORJAPAN/PA. 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: OIIP KMDR KPAO PGOV PINR ECON ELAB JA
SUBJECT:  DAILY SUMMARY OF JAPANESE PRESS 03/08/07 
 
 
INDEX: 
 
(1) Japanese Ambassador to the US Kato: US House of Representatives 
resolution on the wartime comfort women "is not helpful to the 
Japan-US relationship" 
 
(2) Chief cabinet secretary rebuts US newspaper for criticism of 
prime minister 
 
(3) Advice to Prime Minister Abe by Yoshiko Sakurai: He should state 
that "Kono statement was mistaken" 
 
(4) Editorial: Comfort women issue-Kono statement must be inherited 
 
(5) Futenma alternative: Gov't likely to ask for Okinawa governor's 
permit next week for sea access 
 
(6) Matsuoka office's huge utility expenses remain a mystery 
 
ARTICLES: 
 
(1) Japanese Ambassador to the US Kato: US House of Representatives 
resolution on the wartime comfort women "is not helpful to the 
Japan-US relationship" 
 
NIHON KEIZAI (Page 2) (Full) 
Eve., March 8, 2007 
 
Hiroshi Maruya in Washington 
 
In a press conference on March 7, Ambassador the US Ryozo Kato 
commented on the resolution submitted to the House of 
Representatives that demand the Japanese government apologize for 
the so-called comfort-women problem that was caused by the former 
Imperial Japanese Army. He stressed: "In objective terms, since the 
resolution is not based on accurate facts, if it happens to be 
adopted, it would have an ill-effect on Japan-US relations. It would 
not be helpful." On the statement by Prime Minister Abe that even if 
the resolution were passed, he "would not apologize," Kato took the 
view that "his stance was only natural." 
 
Ambassador Kato then explained that there was much documentation on 
record, such as 1) the Japanese government admitted its 
responsibility for the so-called wartime comfort women issue and 
apologized for it; and 2) It created an Asian Women's Fund and 
implemented various projects to help the former comfort women. He 
pointed out that the contents of the House resolution contradicted 
the truth. 
 
(2) Chief cabinet secretary rebuts US newspaper for criticism of 
prime minister 
 
NIHON KEIZAI (Page 2) (Full) 
Eve., March 8, 2007 
 
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuhisa Shiozaki at his press conference 
this morning rebutted the New York Times and other US newspapers for 
their criticism of the Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's response to the 
wartime comfort woman issue, saying, "The Prime Minister's statement 
was not accurately understood in the report." He also revealed that 
the government was considering requesting the newspaper to run its 
rebuttal. 
 
 
TOKYO 00001000  002 OF 007 
 
 
(3) Advice to Prime Minister Abe by Yoshiko Sakurai: He should state 
that "Kono statement was mistaken" 
 
SANKEI (Page 3) (Almost full) 
March 8, 2007 
 
Countries that fall down on foreign affairs will fall. This is what 
I feel strongly now in connection with the issue of "comfort 
women." 
 
I deem now is the time for Japan to face up to the "facts" of the 
comfort women issue with sincerity in order to avoid cases of 
diplomatic failure bringing disgrace on our country's honor and 
withering the spirits of the Japanese people. 
 
Take the resolution now under debate in the US House of 
Representatives seeking Japan's apology. The resolution concludes 
that 200,000 women "were forced by the former Imperial Japanese Army 
into sex slavery" for a period extending from the 1930s. Japan is 
indeed on the verge of the congress of its ally wrongly labeling it 
as a disgraceful nation. 
 
Three women testified at a US House hearing on Feb. 15. One of the 
women, a South Korean, said that when she was 16 in 1944, she joined 
her friend to run away from home before dawn one day and followed a 
Japanese man in civilian clothes. Taking a train and then a ship, 
she, along with the man, arrived at Taiwan, where she realized the 
man was the owner of a wartime brothel. The man tortured her with 
electric shocks and beat her with telephone equipment after binding 
her with telephone wires. She was forced to work as a prostitute but 
she said, "I was never been paid not even once." 
 
If her story is true, this treatment was a hateful act, and I cannot 
help sympathizing with her. 
 
But I wonder whether her testimony had any link to abduction and 
coercion by the Japanese government and its military. As she 
revealed, she, along with her friend, left home. The man who brought 
them to Taiwan was later found to be the owner of a brothel. It is 
crystal clear that the Imperial Japanese Army and the Japanese 
government had nothing to with their having gone to Taiwan, so was 
there no government coercion. 
 
Nonetheless, Representative Honda and other legislators have 
condemned Japan without examining the facts. Mindy Kotler, who has 
been engaged in the postwar compensation issue, also treated the 
comfort women issue in the same way as the Holocaust and denounced 
Japan, arguing that Japan "should stop bringing disgrace on the 
honor of the Japan-US alliance" by denying "coercion". 
 
These women's testimony gave rise to doubts even in South Korea in 
the past. 
 
Ahn Byung Jik, professor at Seoul National University who took part 
in a survey in February 1993 by the South Korean Council on the 
Issue of Volunteer Corps/Council to Study the Volunteer Corps, 
commented (in the book, Yami ni Idomu (Challenge to the darkness), 
authored by Tsutomu Nishioka, a Korea expert in Japan, and published 
by Tokuma Shoten): 
 
"It was not uncommon that witnesses' statements lacked coherence 
with contradictions between the first story and the story that 
followed"; "In some cases, I felt witnesses deliberately bent the 
 
TOKYO 00001000  003 OF 007 
 
 
facts"; and, "There were cases where we had to suspend the 
investigation" 
 
That year, Japan's administration led by Prime Minister Kiichi 
Miyazawa made a concerted effort to carry out investigations, but it 
was unable to spot any facts supporting the charge of coercion. As 
the next step, the administration had examined testimony by 16 women 
in compliance with the strong request by the South Korean 
government, but no questions were allowed, not to mention carrying 
out investigations to prove the testimony. All relevant documents 
are closed to the public even now. Despite that, then Chief Cabinet 
Secretary Yohei Kono released a statement, in which he acknowledged 
 
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as is widely known that there was the fact of "forcing women to work 
in wartime brothels". 
 
Afterwards, then Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobuo Ishihara 
reiterated that despite the lack of facts, the Japanese government 
admitted "coercion" partly because of restoring women's honor and 
complying with South Korea's strong request. 
 
It is easy now to ask why Japan acknowledged such acts without any 
grounds and why Japan did not fight against the issue. But at the 
time, raising such questions would only provoke harsh criticism at 
home and abroad. The Japanese people lacked mental toughness and 
logical consistency necessary for them to advocate what they think 
is true amid a storm of criticism. Japanese diplomacy has lacked 
courage to face up to the facts with sincerity and assert its views 
from a long perspective, instead of always easily conceding with the 
reality it faced. 
 
This tendency is found even in the present-day Japanese diplomacy. 
There is a group of people who are trying to turn a blind eye to 
errors found in the US House resolution as well as the Kono 
statement so as to deal with the matter within the framework of the 
Kono statement. Japanese Ambassador to the US Ryozo Kato explained 
in a letter addressed to the US House of Representatives that the 
Japanese government has repeatedly made an apology, but he has 
failed to cite the factual errors. 
 
Even Michael Green, a pro-Japanese American who formerly served as 
senior director for Asian Affairs at the National Security Council 
(NSC), commented that even though Japan may argue there was no 
"coercion," "Japan cannot win the argument" (Yomiuri Shimbun, 
morning edition of March 4). 
 
In order to block the adoption of the House resolution, an immediate 
crisis for Japan, it may be wise to continue to emphasize that Japan 
has profusely offered apologies. But what do you think will happen 
next? The dishonor of Japan would be only engraved more deeply and 
heavily in history. 
 
Under present-day values, the idea of military brothels is 
unacceptable. We must not repeat such inhumane acts and systems to 
exist. At the same time, we must assert that wartime brothels 
reflected the values of the times. Not only Japan but also other 
countries had similar brothels. Even after World War II, other 
countries in this world established a similar system. 
 
Nonetheless, however, why has only Japan become the focus of 
criticism? Because other countries deem that there was "coercion by 
the former Imperial Japanese Army and the Japanese government. But 
the fact is that coercion never existed. The Kono statement made a 
clear mistake. If Japan fails to claim this point, the issue will 
 
TOKYO 00001000  004 OF 007 
 
 
not be essentially resolved. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is trying to 
focus his attention on the heart of the matter. In this regard, I 
strongly stand by the prime minister's courageous attitude. 
 
(4) Editorial: Comfort women issue-Kono statement must be inherited 
 
MAINICHI (Page 5) (Full) 
March 8, 2007 
 
There is a rise of arguments from among the ruling Liberal 
Democratic Party's lawmakers, calling for the government to review 
its 1993 statement that came from then Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei 
Kono and that owned up to the Imperial Japanese Army's roles over 
the so-called comfort women. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has vowed to 
inherit this Kono statement. However, the prime minister said there 
was nothing to endorse coercion that was defined at first. This 
remark was taken as subscribing to the advocacy of revising the Kono 
statement, and it triggered concerns among Japan's neighbors, such 
as China and South Korea. 
 
Meanwhile, a US congressional resolution, which regards the Kono 
statement as insufficient and demands an official apology from 
Japan, is now before the House of Representatives. 
 
Prime Minister Abe visited China and South Korea shortly after 
coming into office to resume discontinued summit diplomacy with the 
two countries. Those LDP lawmakers' call for retouching the Kono 
statement could damage considerably Japan's improved relations with 
its neighbors. It's only natural that Prime Minister Abe declared 
his intention to take over the Kono statement. 
 
Former South Korean comfort women instituted lawsuits against the 
Japanese government for compensation. Then Prime Minister Kiichi 
Miyazawa's cabinet conducted fact-finding surveys and released the 
Kono statement based on findings from those surveys. The Japanese 
government formally admitted to the Imperial Japanese Army's direct 
and indirect roles in setting up brothels and transporting comfort 
women. The Japanese government then expressed its "sincere apologies 
and remorse." 
 
In the LDP, however, a group of lawmakers thinking over Japan's 
future and history education voiced strong calls for a review of the 
Kono statement on the grounds that there is no evidence to back 
claims that the Japanese military and government authorities used 
coercion to force the women into brothels as comfort women. Such a 
move could be seen as a trend of Japan's rightward tilt, following 
former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visits to Yasukuni 
Shrine. 
 
The Kono statement was not the only form for Japan's apologies to 
former comfort women. In 1995, the Asian Women's Fund was set up. 
The fund delivered private contributions in the form of consolation 
to former comfort women with a letter of apology signed by the prime 
minister. However, it is also true that former comfort women in 
South Korea and other countries refused the prime minister's letter, 
claiming that the letter incorporated no legal responsibilities. 
 
It's possible to say that the Kono statement was a political 
settlement. LDP people insisting on a review of the Kono statement 
cite the government's discovery of no strict evidence with 
historical endorsement as a reason for their advocacy of revising 
the Kono statement. However, it is unavoidable for any political 
settlement on an issue of this sort, which involves war 
 
TOKYO 00001000  005 OF 007 
 
 
responsibilities, to leave some parts ambiguous. If they would try 
to contend the facts of history, the best way is for them to ask 
historians. Japan and China, which have squared off with each other 
time and again over history in their respective perceptions, have 
set up a joint study committee, which is made up of 10 scholars from 
both countries. 
 
If politicians bring up something imprudently, things get entangled 
in many cases, as seen from the advocacy of revising the Kono 
statement. Politicians should first consider Japan's national 
interests from a long-term perspective. They must strictly abstain 
from stirring up unhealthy nationalism. 
 
It is clear what Prime Minister Abe and other Japanese politicians 
should do. They should carefully recount the standpoint of Japan, 
which has offered its apologies over the comfort women issue, in 
order to prevent the US congressional resolution from passing the US 
House of Representatives and in order to wipe away the concerns of 
Japan's neighbors. Prime Minister Abe upholds "asserting diplomacy." 
However, the outcome of asserting must meet Japan's national 
interests. 
 
(5) Futenma alternative: Gov't likely to ask for Okinawa governor's 
permit next week for sea access 
 
OKINAWA TIMES (Page 1) (Abridged) 
March 8, 2007 
 
In connection with the government-planned construction of a new 
facility in a coastal area of Camp Schwab in Nago City as an 
alternative for the US Marine Corps' Futenma Air Station, the 
Defense Facilities Administration Agency is now coordinating with 
the Okinawa prefectural government to set about surveys to look into 
the current state of sea areas, including a fact-finding survey of 
egg-laying corals, sources revealed. For the surveys, the DFAA is 
expected ask for Okinawa Prefecture's consent next week to its 
surveys planned to be implemented in Okinawa Prefecture's public 
waters off the coast of Camp Schwab, according to the sources. The 
DFAA's Naha bureau, if the prefectural government's consent is 
obtained, will select contractors in bidding scheduled for late 
March and will prepare to carry out sea and other environmental 
surveys in April and afterward. 
 
"The say they're going to look into a considerably wide range of sea 
areas," Okinawa Gov. Hirokazu Nakaima said, "so there's no reason 
(for the Okinawa prefectural government) to blame it." With this, 
the governor was flexible about preliminary fact-finding surveys 
before an environmental assessment. 
 
In its coordination with the DFAA, the Okinawa prefectural 
government asked the DFAA to set a range of survey areas that can 
meet Nago City's proposal to build an offshore facility. The DFAA 
side showed its understanding, so the Okinawa prefectural government 
seems to have judged that these surveys differ from the one that is 
premised on the government's alternative airfield plan and that is 
based on the nation's environmental assessment law. 
 
In addition, the DFAA, when asking Okinawa Prefecture in written 
form for its consent, will describe "fact-finding surveys to look 
into the current state of sea areas," instead of describing 
"environmental fact-finding surveys," in an aim to weaken linkage 
with a legally mandatory environmental assessment. 
 
 
TOKYO 00001000  006 OF 007 
 
 
However, these planned fact-finding surveys are also expected to 
look into egg-laying corals and seaweed beds. 
 
Even in case these surveys are conducted as preliminary surveys, 
their results can be reflected in an environmental assessment. 
However, Okinawa Prefecture will disclose information about the 
government's environmental assessment survey for public review and 
will make a decision with the governor's statement, according to a 
prefectural government official. "The surveys planned this time are 
not formal ones under the law and will be implemented by contractors 
on their own responsibilities and judgment," the official said. 
 
Meanwhile, the DFAA is expected to carefully determine when to 
disclose information for public review about its law-based 
environmental assessment survey for Okinawa Prefecture and its 
municipalities, with an eye to a potential impact on political 
events, such as a by-election to be officially announced on April 5 
for the House of Councillors. 
 
(6) Matsuoka office's huge utility expenses remain a mystery 
 
ASAHI (Page 39) (Abridged) 
March 8, 2007 
 
The Asahi Shimbun has found that all the Abe cabinet ministers, 
advisors to the prime minister, senior vice ministers, and 
parliamentary secretaries who have their offices in the Dietmembers' 
Office Buildings did not declare any utilities in their political 
fund reports for 2005 -- except for one cabinet minister: 
Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries Minister Toshikatsu Matsuoka. 
The farm minister declared approximately 5.07 million yen as 
utilities. The figure particularly stands out against the backdrop 
that utilities in the Dietmembers' Office Buildings are all covered 
by tax money. Before the Upper House Budget Committee yesterday, 
Matsuoka simply reiterated that his office has reported its expenses 
appropriately. 
 
According to the political fund reports and other documents, the 
Dietmembers' Office Buildings house "main offices" of the fund 
management organizations of some 20 cabinet ministers and senior 
vice ministers that total about 70. Of them, nine lawmakers who have 
their offices only in the Dietmembers' Office Buildings indicated in 
the Asahi Shimbun interviews that they had not declared an utilities 
expenses. "I cannot declare utilities because my office exists only 
in the Dietmembers' Office Building, which does not charge for 
utilities," one lawmaker said. Similar explanations came from other 
lawmakers, as well. 
 
The Political Funds Control Law Enforcement Ordinance defines 
utilities as fees for electricity, gas, water, and instruments for 
them. 
 
An LDP Lower House lawmaker who had declared no utilities clearly 
said: "Usually it's not possible for an office located in the 
Dietmembers' Office Building to spend 5 million yen for utilities." 
 
A secretary to an Upper House lawmaker took this view: "Office 
expenses might include the bills for water purifiers and 
humidifiers, but it's not realistic for a single office to consume 
water totaling 5 million yen." 
 
The fund statements by the remaining 10 lawmakers included 90,000 
yen to 1.03 million yen in utilities. Those lawmakers had offices 
 
TOKYO 00001000  007 OF 007 
 
 
other than in the Dietmembers' Office Buildings, however. 
 
Expenses declared by Matsuoka's fund management organization 
 
Year             Utilities            Office Expenses 
2001         6.59 million yen        26.42 million yen 
2002         7.79 million yen        24.75 million yen 
2003         4.16 million yen        26.32 million yen 
2004         5.18 million yen        31.66 million yen 
2005         5.07 million yen        33.59 million yen 
Total       28.81 million yen       142.75 million yen 
 
Matsuoka uses the word "appropriate" 23 times in Upper House 
session 
 
In the Upper House Budget Committee session yesterday, farm minister 
Matsuoka repeatedly said that his fund management body has reported 
utilities "appropriately." Matsuoka indicated on March 5 that he 
would offer detailed explanations after checking facts with his 
office. Opposition parties accordingly demanded his explanations 
yesterday, but Matsuoka dodged their demands, saying: "The existing 
system does not require information disclosure, so I would like to 
abstain from doing so." 
 
"My fund management organization informed me that it has reported 
expenses appropriately." In response to questions yesterday from 
Social Democratic Party member Hirokazu Shiba and Japanese Communist 
Party lawmaker Satoshi Inoue, Matsuoka used the word "appropriate" 
23 times. 
 
Matsuoka replied on March 5: "A water purifier is installed in the 
office. Office expenses included fees for heating and the like. 
Taking the Diet floor yesterday, Shiba said: "Water purifiers and 
heaters should come under equipment and expendables." Inoue grilled 
Matsuoka, asking: "Utilities by your two offices in Kumamoto ran to 
660,000 yen and 380,000 yen, respectively. Utilities by your office 
in the Dietmembers' Office Building are far greater than those 
locations. How do you explain that?" But Matsuoka refused to offer a 
clear explanation. 
 
Some LDP lawmakers had speculated that Matsuoka would weather the 
storm by blaming the accounting manager. But on March 5, Matsuoka 
categorically said: "I gave my consent to the figures in the fund 
reports." Matsuoka can no longer blame his chief accountant. 
 
SCHIEFFER