Vet News: Senate Acknowledges Unjust Treatment of Former POWs

WASHINGTON, July 21 /PRNewswire/ -- Senate action Thursday, July 17, to provide compensation to U.S. servicemen who were forced into slave labor by Japanese companies during World War II is a good first step in the appropriations process this year, according to Justice for Veterans, a national coalition of former POW slave laborers.

The "Resolution of Claims of American POWs of the Japanese Act of 2003," an amendment to the Department of Defense appropriations bill, provides up to $10,000 to each former slave laborer, a sum that Senator Orrin Hatch, the legislation’s sponsor, acknowledges "is a mere fraction of what [the POWs] truly deserve." Calling the legislation a first step that "recognizes the struggle to compensate American POWs once held and forced into slave labor for private Japanese companies," Hatch, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he intends to seek "additional amounts."

"We are grateful that the United States Senate has acknowledged what we suffered -- the horrendous conditions of our captivity -- and the way our forced labor unjustly enriched some of the most powerful companies in modern- day Japan," said Lester Tenney, a former slave laborer and spokesperson for Justice for Veterans. "We are grateful that the Senate overwhelmingly expressed its support to help us find both an acknowledgement of what we suffered and to begin the effort of compensation. But we consider this only a beginning."

Congressional action is critical, since the Japanese companies that benefited from POW slave labor have been able to avoid taking responsibility in the courts thus far, with the assistance of the U.S. Departments of State and Justice. "Congress is the last recourse for these POWs," said Hatch. "Instead of helping, our government has let them down."

"It’s our hope that this first step by the Senate will send a clear message that Congress is serious about righting one of history’s great wrongs," said Tenney. "The Japanese companies have hidden behind the U.S. State and Justice Departments and their insistence that the rights of American POWs were bartered away as part of a treaty, despite the fact that that same treaty contains a provision that should require Japan to compensate Americans it forced into slave labor."

According to the State Department, a peace treaty signed in 1951 prohibits reparations from private Japanese companies to U.S. citizens. The Department has consistently sided with these companies when former POW slave laborers have tried to press their grievances in court. The former POWs dispute this interpretation and also note that another provision in the treaty, Article 26, holds that if Japan provides greater advantages to another nation in a separate treaty, then those advantages must be extended to United States citizens. In a separate treaty between Japan and the Netherlands, Japan gave individuals of that nation the right to seek reparations. Japan also negotiated separate arrangements with other nations.

Senator Joseph Biden, ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Senators Dianne Feinstein and Tom Harkin, both Democratic members of the Senate Appropriations Committee, also assisted with this effort to provide long overdue compensation to these former POWs. They have indicated that they are seriously committed to working with Chairman Hatch to provide additional compensation and to help the former POWs achieve the justice they are seeking from the Japanese companies.

"We will continue to press our cause," said Tenney. "We can hope that this Senate action will not only open the door to further Congressional activity, but will also compel Japan, the unjustly enriched companies and our State and Justice Departments to step up and do what is right for the thousands of American servicemen forced into slave labor."