By TAKUYA SUZUKI/ Correspondent
June 7, 2021 at 19:05 JST
Protesters wave signs calling for Japan to apologize as they rally near a statue symbolizing wartime Korean laborers for Japanese companies near the Japanese Consulate in Busan on March 1, 2019. (Takuya Suzuki)
SEOUL--The Seoul Central District Court on June 7 dismissed claims by former Korean workers and bereaved families in a damages suit against 16 Japanese companies over wartime labor.
The plaintiffs filed the lawsuit against 17 Japanese companies in May 2015, claiming that they or their relatives were forced to work at factories on the main islands of Japan during World War II.
The companies being sued include Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd., Nippon Steel Corp., Mitsui E&S Holdings Co., ENEOS Corp., Sumitomo Metal Mining Co. and Mitsubishi Materials Corp.
The plaintiffs dropped the case against one of the companies in May.
The defendants had argued that they are not liable for the damages in line with the stance taken by the Japanese government, which maintains that the 1965 bilateral agreement between Tokyo and Seoul settled all compensation claims by South Korea from World War II.
In a separate wartime labor compensation case, the South Korean Supreme Court in the fall of 2018 ordered Nippon Steel and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to pay damages to the plaintiffs.
The ruling said wartime mobilization of Korean laborers to factories and other sites in Japan constitutes “inhumane and unlawful acts by Japanese companies connected to the Japanese government’s illegal colonial occupation and execution of a war of aggression.”
17 Japanese firms face South Korean wartime damages suit
March 18, 2021
Moon ‘honestly bewildered’ by ruling in favor of ‘comfort women’
January 18, 2021
Seoul court orders Japan to pay former ‘comfort women’
January 8, 2021
Nippon Steel to appeal South Korean asset seizure
August 4, 2020
Seoul court puts off ruling in ‘comfort women’ suit until March
January 12, 2021
Seoul court sides with Japan in ‘comfort women’ suit
April 21, 2021
Here is a collection of first-hand accounts by “hibakusha” atomic bomb survivors.
A peek through the music industry’s curtain at the producers who harnessed social media to help their idols go global.
Cooking experts, chefs and others involved in the field of food introduce their special recipes intertwined with their paths in life.
A series based on diplomatic documents declassified by Japan’s Foreign Ministry
A series about Japanese-Americans and their memories of World War II
