Warmbier summoned to the comfort women’s hand station… “The US also asked North Korea responsibility”

Attorney Kim Gang-won, the legal representative of the comfort women victims’ lawsuit, held a trial for the first trial of 12 comfort women victims, including the late grandmother Bae Chun-hee, filed against the Japanese government on January 8 at the Central District Court in Seocho-gu, Seoul. You are answering the question. [뉴스1]

An additional conclusion of a lawsuit for damages filed by 20 elderly comfort women victims of the Japanese military against the Japanese government will come out on the 21st of next month. Another diplomatic wave is expected after the Japanese government decided to lose the first trial lawsuit by other grandmothers such as Lee Yong-soo in January.

The 15th Civil Affairs Division of the Seoul Central District Court (Director Seong-cheol Min) concluded the date for the defense of the Son Baeso, in which 20 people, including Gwak Ye-nam grandmother, charged 100 million won to the Japanese government.

The biggest issue on this day was whether it is possible to apply state immunity to the Japanese government. State immunity is an international law principle that states that no country is subject to the jurisdiction of another country.

The lawyers said, “When there is a conflict between the’right to be tried’ and the’state immunity’ under customary international law, the two must be compared and judged individually. Considering the spirit of international human rights treaties, the exception of state immunity in this case. “You have to admit it.”

Japan does not recognize the jurisdiction itself of the Korean side in the related lawsuit and adheres to the principle of staging, so it was conducted in the form of a default trial without an agent on the defendant side.

Instead, the judiciary examined the legal issues and exchanged questions and answers fiercely as if they were fighting with the lawyers.

The court judges how the case differs from the 2012 International Court of Justice (ICJ) precedent (also known as the Ferrini lawsuit) that recognized state immunity, and how the 2015 Korea-Japan comfort women agreement could affect the lawsuit. Asked.

The Ferini lawsuit was the case in which the ICJ raised the hand of the German government in a lawsuit filed against the German government by Ferini, an Italian citizen who was conscripted by Nazi Germany during World War II. The ICJ ruled that Germany’s state immunity should be recognized, saying, “You cannot be held legally liable for any illegal activities that occurred during the armed conflict, according to the state immunity.” The Japanese government’s claim that “Korea is violating international law” is based on this.

In response, the lawyers refuted that “the Korean peninsula was not a party to armed conflict at the time of the damage to the comfort women.” Unlike Germany and Italy, which were parties to the Second World War, it is a logic that Korea did not participate in World War II as a party, nor was it in conflict with Japan, the perpetrator. For this reason, they argued that the ICJ precedent should not be applied to the victims of comfort women.

The judge also asked, “Is not the 2015 Korea-Japan Comfort Women Agreement as an alternative remedy for rights?” and “What are your opinions on the claim that this agreement is an exercise of the Korean government’s diplomatic protection rights?”

The lawyers heard the decision of the Constitutional Court in 2019 regarding the settlement of the comfort women. The Constitution dismissed the “comfort women’s agreement, which does not constitute a legal requirement for the unconstitutionality of the agreement,” but made extraordinary details about the legal nature of the agreement. “The 2015 agreement was only a political agreement, and because it was not legally binding, the victims’ right to claim compensation has not extinguished,” he said.

The lawyers emphasized that “therefore, the victims’ right to claim compensation has not extinguished just because they received contributions from the Reconciliation and Healing Foundation.”

The lawyers said, “The United States and the United Kingdom have revised the law so that they can exercise jurisdiction in matters such as terrorism,” and cited the case of Otto Warmbier, a young American who died in 2017. “At the time of the Warmbier incident, North Korea was not designated as a US state sponsor of terrorism, but was re-designated as a torture of Warmbier.” .

Otto Warmbier’s parents on the UN witness stand. [AP=연합뉴스]

Wormbeer died after being detained in North Korea, returning to a vegetative state in 2017. A US federal court ruled in a lawsuit filed against the North Korean government by Warmbier in 2018 that “the North Korean regime should reimburse 500 million dollars.”

The sentence was originally held on January 13th, but was postponed. Five days before the sentence, other judges ruled in favor of the plaintiff, and it was observed that the public opinion was burdened.

The lawsuit is led by Lee Sang-hee (49, 28th Judicial Research and Training Institute) at the Lawyers’ Association for Democratic Society (Minbyeon). It is also interesting to note that Constitutional Judge Lee Mi-sun (51/26), who participated in the hearing on the consensus judgment of the comfort women of the Constitutional Constitution in 2019, as the basis for the lawsuit, is Lee’s real sister.

Reporter Lee Yoo-jung [email protected]