A woman who survived the Nanking Massacre and won a landmark defamation lawsuit in Japanese courts earlier this year has been paid compensation of more than 4.55 million yen (HK$355,000).
Xia Shuqin, 80, told Xinhua that her lawyers in Japan had received the libel damages for the lawsuit against a Japanese writer and his publishing house that have accused her in print of bearing false witness.
Mainland experts said she was the only survivor of the 1937 atrocities to receive compensation from Japan during her lifetime.
“I feel greatly relieved,” said Ms Xia, a vocal advocate for survivors of the massacre, in which about 300,000 Chinese people were estimated to have been killed. “The compensation is a comfort to all those who suffered in the massacre.”
The three-year lawsuit ended in February when the Japanese Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Shudo Higashinakano, the right-wing author of Nanjing Massacre: A Thorough Investigation, and Tendensha, a publishing house. The book denied the extent of the brutality and claimed she and other survivors fabricated their accounts.
Ms Xia maintained that Japanese soldiers killed seven out of nine members of her immediate family on December 12, 1937, when she was eight, and that she and her four-year-old sister were seriously wounded.
Courts in China have ruled that Professor Higashinakano libelled survivors of the massacre, including Ms Xia, in the 1998 book, which was translated into English and Chinese and had sold thousands of copies.
Of about 100 cases for apologies and compensation brought in Japan’s courts since the mid-1990s by victims of Japanese aggression, only Ms Xia and another Chinese woman succeeded.
According to Jing Shenghong, a history expert at Nanjing Normal University, Ms Xia’s victory was partly attributed to a series of independent evidence from other countries, including a documentary by American John Magee. Magee’s film, believed to be the only documentary on the massacre, was first shown in the US in 1938, Xinhua said.
Professor Jing said the victory in the defamation case marked an important step in clarifying historical facts and defeating Japanese right-wingers who attempted to whitewash or deny that part of history.
“The victory of Ms Xia in Japan is not only important for Ms Xia and other survivors of the massacre to seek belated justice, but also a step on the part of Japan towards fully acknowledging the facts about the atrocities,” he said yesterday.
He said Sino-Japanese relations, which had been repeatedly affected by historical problems, would also benefit from Ms Xia’s victory.
Despite the symbolic significance of the victory, Professor Jing noted Japanese courts had rejected other compensation cases and there was still a long way to go before Japan stopped denying its war record.
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Survivor of Nanking gets libel damages
Shi Jiangtao in Beijing
18 April 2009
A woman who survived the Nanking Massacre and won a landmark defamation lawsuit in Japanese courts earlier this year has been paid compensation of more than 4.55 million yen (HK$355,000).
Xia Shuqin, 80, told Xinhua that her lawyers in Japan had received the libel damages for the lawsuit against a Japanese writer and his publishing house that have accused her in print of bearing false witness.
Mainland experts said she was the only survivor of the 1937 atrocities to receive compensation from Japan during her lifetime.
“I feel greatly relieved,” said Ms Xia, a vocal advocate for survivors of the massacre, in which about 300,000 Chinese people were estimated to have been killed. “The compensation is a comfort to all those who suffered in the massacre.”
The three-year lawsuit ended in February when the Japanese Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Shudo Higashinakano, the right-wing author of Nanjing Massacre: A Thorough Investigation, and Tendensha, a publishing house. The book denied the extent of the brutality and claimed she and other survivors fabricated their accounts.
Ms Xia maintained that Japanese soldiers killed seven out of nine members of her immediate family on December 12, 1937, when she was eight, and that she and her four-year-old sister were seriously wounded.
Courts in China have ruled that Professor Higashinakano libelled survivors of the massacre, including Ms Xia, in the 1998 book, which was translated into English and Chinese and had sold thousands of copies.
Of about 100 cases for apologies and compensation brought in Japan’s courts since the mid-1990s by victims of Japanese aggression, only Ms Xia and another Chinese woman succeeded.
According to Jing Shenghong, a history expert at Nanjing Normal University, Ms Xia’s victory was partly attributed to a series of independent evidence from other countries, including a documentary by American John Magee. Magee’s film, believed to be the only documentary on the massacre, was first shown in the US in 1938, Xinhua said.
Professor Jing said the victory in the defamation case marked an important step in clarifying historical facts and defeating Japanese right-wingers who attempted to whitewash or deny that part of history.
“The victory of Ms Xia in Japan is not only important for Ms Xia and other survivors of the massacre to seek belated justice, but also a step on the part of Japan towards fully acknowledging the facts about the atrocities,” he said yesterday.
He said Sino-Japanese relations, which had been repeatedly affected by historical problems, would also benefit from Ms Xia’s victory.
Despite the symbolic significance of the victory, Professor Jing noted Japanese courts had rejected other compensation cases and there was still a long way to go before Japan stopped denying its war record.
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