Comfort Women and the Failure of International Law
Seong Eun Lee discusses the failure of international law to hold states responsible for their use of women as sexual slaves during the Pacific War. The history of international treaties and regulations outlawing such behaviour are briefly reviewed, as is the current state of the former comfort women’s struggle for justice. The author argues that interlocking structures of oppression based on power imbalances of gender and ethnicity have continued to frustrate this struggle in the arena of international law.
Key words: Korea, Japan, comfort women, international law, development, South Asia, World War II, gender, peace and conflict, ethnicity, sexual slavery, justice.
Sudan: Another resource war?
The world’s attention was recently attracted to the Darfur region in the west of Sudan, where the conflict has escalated in recent weeks, fearing a second Rwanda might take place. An estimated 1,000 people per week are dying in the region.