Regarding the July 15 Zeit Gist article, "Human rights -- strictly personal, strictly Japanese?": Doshisa Law School professor Colin P.A. Jones suggests that the Justice Ministry would like us to think, at least where Japan is concerned, that "human rights violations are a problem caused by citizens with an inadequate understanding of the subject," rather than by abuse violations of the International Declaration of Human Rights by the state.
So it is instructive to read the report on the human rights situation in Japan prepared by Human Rights Now in February for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. The areas where Japan falls behind both international standards and its own treaty obligations are too numerous to detail, but here are just a few.
According to HRN: "Most courts in Japan . . . disregard international human rights standards." Suspects are subject to "hostage justice" in which they are confined for 23 days and subject to forced confessions and serious misconduct by the police with judges tending to lend too much weight to these confessions (Japan has a 99.8 percent percent conviction rate). Instances of torture in prison abound, resulting in at least several deaths. Other areas of concern are the suppression of dissent and freedom of thought in education.
None of this should be news. Much of it has been reported by The Japan Times and, occasionally, by other news outlets. The question is whether people's consciousness will ever be raised to the extent that those who abuse their authority will be held accountable for their criminal acts. This is what separates Japan from yet qualifying as a true democracy.
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