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C O N F I D E N T I A L TOKYO 001412 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/29/2027 
TAGS: PREL PHUM KS CH ID PH JA
SUBJECT: PM ABE, OTHERS HAVE NOW "GOT THE MESSAGE" ON 
COMFORT WOMEN 
 
Classified By: Ambassador J. Thomas Schieffer.  Reasons: 
1.4 (b)(d). 
 
¶1. (C) Summary.  PM Abe, DCCS Shimomura and other high-level 
Japanese officials will not speak out on the comfort women 
issue, at least until after the July Upper House election, 
according to MOFA Asian Regional Policy Division Director 
Aikawa.  They will withhold comment for "tactical" domestic 
political reasons, as well as a better understanding of the 
diplomatic sensitivities, he claimed.  Comments by the 
Ambassador and other "foreign friends," even though 
unpalatable, had been reluctantly received and helpful. 
Aikawa was mildly hopeful that plans by conservative LDP 
members to revisit the comfort women and Nanjing Incident 
issues would be dropped.  End Summary. 
 
¶2. (C) The Prime Minister is surrounded by like-minded people 
when it comes to the comfort women issue, MOFA's Asia 
Regional Policy Director Kazutoshi Aikawa (strictly protect) 
observed to us March 30.  He pointed to Deputy Chief Cabinet 
Secretary Hakubun Shimomura, Agriculture Minister Toshikatsu 
 
SIPDIS 
Matsuoka, Minister of Internal Affairs and Communication 
Yoshihide Suga, Justice Minister Jinen Nagase, and State 
Minister for Administrative Reform Yoshimi Watanabe as all 
having been members of the Parliamentary League of Junior 
Lawmakers to Consider Japan's Future and History Education. 
The League was formed in 1997 during an earlier period of 
textbook reevaluation over the comfort women.  Abe was the 
chief of the League's secretariat and Shimomura was deputy 
chief of the secretariat.  The secretary general then was 
Seiichi Eto, whom Abe recently allowed back into the LDP 
after Koizumi expelled him in 2005 as a postal rebel, Aikawa 
noted. 
 
¶3. (C) DCCS Shimomura, who has been outspoken in denying 
government involvement in the comfort women issue, comes from 
the education field and owns a chain of cram schools, Aikawa 
explained.  That is how he first got involved in the textbook 
issue.  Aikawa assured us that Shimomura, like PM Abe, has 
now "gotten the message."  Neither will speak out before the 
Upper House election.  Elaborating, Aikawa explained that the 
LDP right-wing is under pressure from its coalition partner 
New Komeito to stop talking about the issue, lest it become a 
campaign issue prior to the July Upper House election.  Even 
the "true believers" understand that they need Komeito 
support and so, for tactical reasons, if nothing else, they 
will remain silent "for the time being."  Aikawa also 
believed that comments by Ambassador Schieffer and "old 
friends" of Japan like former NSC Director Mike Green, had 
been helpful.  MOFA has been trying to explain the diplomatic 
sensitivity of the issue, but the message had not been 
getting through.  He acknowledged that it was useful for 
these people to get the message, however unpalatable, from 
the Ambassador and others. 
 
¶4. (C) The Prime Minister and the people around him are "true 
believers" who will not change their position on the comfort 
women issue, Aikawa observed.  Half in jest, he said "The 
Prime Minister knows too much."  Abe literally knows more 
about the issue than any other Diet member, having studied it 
for the past ten years, Aikawa asserted.  Abe believes what 
he said about "coercion in the narrow sense" and "coercion in 
the broader sense."  The difference between Abe and Koizumi 
is that Koizumi, who is not a detail-oriented person, would 
just have gruffly said "I apologize, I apologize," Aikawa 
suggested. 
 
Kono Statement, Nanjing Incident Revisits Now Unlikely? 
--------------------------------------------- ---------- 
 
¶5. (C) Asked about plans by an informal group of lawmakers to 
revise the Kono Statement and reexamine the Nanjing Incident, 
Aikawa explained that Nariaki Nakayama, who heads the 
informal group that wants to reexamine the Kono Statement, 
may be censured by the LDP because he backed a DPJ candidate 
in his native Miyazaki prefecture.  Tooru Toita, who heads 
the group that wants to reexamine the Nanjing Incident, is 
considered "way out" even by conservatives.  Many 
conservative Diet members who are upset about the Honda 
resolution and the comfort women issue, understand that the 
Nanjing Incident happened and that arguing about the number 
of victims is counterproductive.  For those reasons, Aikawa 
said he was hopeful that the proposed reexaminations would 
not go forward at all. 
 
Release of Diet Library Documents on Yasukuni 
--------------------------------------------- 
 
¶6. (C) Aikawa, who is also responsible at MOFA for the 
Yasukuni issue, said he was totally surprised by the March 28 
release by the Diet Library of documents showing involvement 
by the former Ministry of Health and Welfare in the 
enshrinement in Yasukuni Shrine of war criminals.  No one, 
not even the Kantei, had been informed in advance.  He did 
not believe there was any ulterior motive in the timing, but 
lamented the fact that neither MOFA nor the Kantei had been 
consulted prior to their release so that the issue of timing 
could have been addressed.  Abe's comments that the 
government's involvement in the matter was "not a problem" 
had -- so far -- not resonated much or become a diplomatic 
issue, Aikawa observed.  He was relieved that both the 
Chinese and South Korean governments were taking a relatively 
low-key approach to both the comfort women and Yasukuni 
document issues. 
 
Asian Women's Fund, Kono's Remarks to Critics 
--------------------------------------------- 
 
¶7. (C) The Asian Women's Fund, which was set up in 1995 as a 
mechanism to compensate comfort women, will end on March 31 
after 12 years, Aikawa observed.  That date had been set 
several years ago, long before the issue re-ignited.  Aikawa 
described at some length the difficulties of trying to assist 
comfort women in South Korea, compared to in Indonesia and 
the Philippines.  China had "opted out" from the beginning 
for domestic political reasons, even though, he claimed, 
Japan had offered several times to provide assistance by 
setting up "assistance homes" for elderly Chinese former 
comfort women.  After the Fund dissolves, several NGO's will 
pick up its work. 
 
¶8. (C) Asked about remarks attributed to Yohei Kono in a book 
to be published shortly by the Asian Women's Fund that 
castigated critics of the Kono Statement as "intellectually 
insincere," Aikawa said he had been concerned that the 
remarks were "rather inflammatory."  Using such language in 
Japanese is quite insulting, he said.  Kono was apparently 
asked if he really wanted the remarks included in the 
article.  He said it was fine with him, according to Aikawa. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶9. (C) Aikawa appeared confident that PM Abe and those around 
him would maintain a low-profile on the comfort women issue 
through the July election.  How much of his judgment is based 
on knowledge of Kantei deliberations and how much is wishful 
thinking is unclear.  Even granting that a tactical decision 
has been made to desist from comment for the time being, the 
possibility always exists that someone can be goaded into 
making remarks, particularly if the cast of characters feels 
as strongly about the matter as Aikawa claims.  Aikawa hoped 
that, at this point, "foreign friends," too, would keep the 
volume down. 
SCHIEFFER