World

Japan Offers Apology And Compensation For Forced Sterilization Victims

(CHARLY TRIBALLEAU/AFP/Getty Images)

Graeme Gallagher Contributor
Font Size:

Tens of thousands of victims of forced sterilization in Japan were offered an apology and are entitled to compensation under a new law passed on Wednesday.

From 1948 to 1996, the Eugenics Protection Law forced people to undergo sterilization operations to prevent them from having “inferior” children. Those affected had physical or cognitive disabilities, mental illnesses, behavioral problems or even leprosy, according to BBC.

Surviving victims of the operations, who were mostly children and teenagers at the time, will each receive $29,000 in compensation. They will have five years to apply for compensation, which will first have to be approved by a board of experts. (RELATED: Tennessee Judge Ends Sterilization Program Following Criticism)

Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe delivers a speech during a joint press conference with Italian Prime Minister following their meeting at the Palazzo Chigi, in Rome, on April 24, 2019. (TIZIANA FABI/AFP/Getty Images)

Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe delivers a speech during a joint press conference with Italian Prime Minister following their meeting at the Palazzo Chigi, in Rome, on April 24, 2019. (TIZIANA FABI/AFP/Getty Images)

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe issued an apology for the “great suffering” that the victims endured: “During the period the law was in effect, many people were subjected to operations that made them unable to have children based on their having a disability or another chronic illness, causing them great suffering.”

He continued, “As the government that carried out this law, after deep reflection, I would like to apologize from the bottom of my heart.”

Currently, around 20 victims of the past law are suing the government for their actions with the first judgment in one of the cases coming in May. One woman is suing the Japanese government for $98,000 for being sterilized at the age of 15 in 1972 after being diagnosed with “hereditary feeble-mindedness.” (RELATED: The New Solution To Venezuelan Poverty: Sterilization)

“We’ve had agonising days,” said the woman’s sister in January. “We stood up to make this society brighter.”

People walk on a street in the Shibuya neighbourhood in Tokyo on April 18, 2019. (CHARLY TRIBALLEAU/AFP/Getty Images)

People walk on a street in the Shibuya neighbourhood in Tokyo on April 18, 2019. (CHARLY TRIBALLEAU/AFP/Getty Images)

Made in the aftermath of World War II, the past sterilization law is believed to have affected at least 25,000 people in its 48-year history. Few records remain of the time, however, 16,000 people are thought to not have given consent. The last surgery was performed in 1993 until the law was revoked in 1996.

Japan was not the only country to have a sterilization law. Nazi Germany began sterilizations in 1934 and it is estimated that 300,000 to 400,000 people had operations under the law. Additionally, Sweden sterilized 63,000 people to improve “racial purity” under a law that was approved until 1976. The country began compensations for victims in 1999. (RELATED: School To Remove Name Of Former University Of Vermont President Who Supported The Eugenics Movement)

While Japan no longer has sterilizations for eugenic purposes, they still enforce a 2004 law that forces sterilizations for transgender people who seek to change their gender on official records. The law requires those who seek to change genders to have their original reproductive removed and have a body that “appears to have parts that resemble the genital organs” of the desired gender.

PREMIUM ARTICLE: Subscribe To Keep Reading

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign Up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
BENEFITS READERS PASS PATRIOTS FOUNDERS
Daily and Breaking Newsletters
Daily Caller Shows
Ad Free Experience
Exclusive Articles
Custom Newsletters
Editor Daily Rundown
Behind The Scenes Coverage
Award Winning Documentaries
Patriot War Room
Patriot Live Chat
Exclusive Events
Gold Membership Card
Tucker Mug

What does Founders Club include?

Tucker Mug and Membership Card
Founders

Readers,

Instead of sucking up to the political and corporate powers that dominate America, The Daily Caller is fighting for you — our readers. We humbly ask you to consider joining us in this fight.

Now that millions of readers are rejecting the increasingly biased and even corrupt corporate media and joining us daily, there are powerful forces lined up to stop us: the old guard of the news media hopes to marginalize us; the big corporate ad agencies want to deprive us of revenue and put us out of business; senators threaten to have our reporters arrested for asking simple questions; the big tech platforms want to limit our ability to communicate with you; and the political party establishments feel threatened by our independence.

We don't complain -- we can't stand complainers -- but we do call it how we see it. We have a fight on our hands, and it's intense. We need your help to smash through the big tech, big media and big government blockade.

We're the insurgent outsiders for a reason: our deep-dive investigations hold the powerful to account. Our original videos undermine their narratives on a daily basis. Even our insistence on having fun infuriates them -- because we won’t bend the knee to political correctness.

One reason we stand apart is because we are not afraid to say we love America. We love her with every fiber of our being, and we think she's worth saving from today’s craziness.

Help us save her.

A second reason we stand out is the sheer number of honest responsible reporters we have helped train. We have trained so many solid reporters that they now hold prominent positions at publications across the political spectrum. Hear a rare reasonable voice at a place like CNN? There’s a good chance they were trained at Daily Caller. Same goes for the numerous Daily Caller alumni dominating the news coverage at outlets such as Fox News, Newsmax, Daily Wire and many others.

Simply put, America needs solid reporters fighting to tell the truth or we will never have honest elections or a fair system. We are working tirelessly to make that happen and we are making a difference.

Since 2010, The Daily Caller has grown immensely. We're in the halls of Congress. We're in the Oval Office. And we're in up to 20 million homes every single month. That's 20 million Americans like you who are impossible to ignore.

We can overcome the forces lined up against all of us. This is an important mission but we can’t do it unless you — the everyday Americans forgotten by the establishment — have our back.

Please consider becoming a Daily Caller Patriot today, and help us keep doing work that holds politicians, corporations and other leaders accountable. Help us thumb our noses at political correctness. Help us train a new generation of news reporters who will actually tell the truth. And help us remind Americans everywhere that there are millions of us who remain clear-eyed about our country's greatness.

In return for membership, Daily Caller Patriots will be able to read The Daily Caller without any of the ads that we have long used to support our mission. We know the ads drive you crazy. They drive us crazy too. But we need revenue to keep the fight going. If you join us, we will cut out the ads for you and put every Lincoln-headed cent we earn into amplifying our voice, training even more solid reporters, and giving you the ad-free experience and lightning fast website you deserve.

Patriots will also be eligible for Patriots Only content, newsletters, chats and live events with our reporters and editors. It's simple: welcome us into your lives, and we'll welcome you into ours.

We can save America together.

Become a Daily Caller Patriot today.

Signature

Neil Patel