台北時報によると、台湾外務省の黃明朗事務局長（写真は馬英九総統）は定例記者会見で、正月休み明けにも日本政府との交渉の中で慰安婦問題を取り上げていくという方針を明らかにした。
「台湾政府の公式の立場は、一貫して、すぐにでも日本政府は謝罪して賠償しなければならないというものだ」と黃は述べている。
黃はまた、台湾や韓国、フィリピンの一部の慰安婦は日本の民間の団体がスポンサーになった基金から償い金を受け取ったが、日本政府が慰安婦を騙したり募集していたことを公式に認めていないので十分ではないと述べた、と台北時報は伝えている。台北市婦女救援基金會は、慰安婦の総数を50万人と主張している。
台湾では、先日馬総統が慰安婦展に出席して日本の歴史認識を批判している。 戦後生まれで外省人である彼が当時を知らないのは仕方ないが、国民党軍が「慰安婦」を利用していたことは知っていていいはずだ。
馬総統は、委細構わず、とにかく気の毒な人の為に何かしてやろうと考える鳩山由紀夫タイプなのかもしれない。鳩山は現実を突きつけられて自分の考えが浅かったと認めたわけだが。
Talks on comfort women expected
By Shih Hsiu-chuan / Staff Reporter
The government might soon enter talks with the Japanese government and demand that it offer an official apology and provide compensation to Taiwanese women used as sex slaves by the Japanese Imperial Army during World War II, a diplomatic official said yesterday.
Huang Ming-lung (黃明朗), secretary-general of the East Asian Relations Commission of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told a regular press conference that the ministry would bring up the issue with Japanese officials as soon as the government resumes operations after the New Year break.
Attending an exhibition on Sunday highlighting litigation by Taiwanese against Japan over the issue of comfort women, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said he regretted the Japanese government’s failure to acknowledge its mistakes and promised to seek justice for the women.
“The position of the Taiwanese government has been that the Japanese government has to apologize and compensate the comfort women as soon as possible,” Huang said.
Japan has rejected such requests from the Taiwanese government in the past, but Taipei has never wavered from its position, he said.
Although some Taiwanese victims, along with victims from Korea and the Philippines, had previously obtained compensation from a fund sponsored by several Japanese civic groups, they considered it inappropriate and insufficient because Tokyo has refused to admit the women were either recruited or swindled by the Japanese government to become comfort women, Huang said.
The number of comfort women conscripted by Japan during World War II is estimated to have reached 500,000 throughout East and Southeast Asia, the Taipei Women’s Rescue Foundation says.
台北時報2010.12.29
