¹ See Arirang.TV, “The Innerview (Ep.196) Kim Seo-kyung and Kim Eun-sung, the sculptors _ Full Episode.”

² See also Daniel Schumacher, “Whose History Do We Tell in Public?” Public History Weekly 9:2 (18 March 2021).

³ See Esther Felden, “Freiburg und die Trostfrau” [Freiburg and the Comfort Woman], Deutsche Welle (21 September 2016).

⁴ The title of the exhibition in Munich was “Art 5 Kunst und Demokratie.”

⁵ Personal communication, July 2021.

⁶ The history of the “history wars” over the Statue of Peace is summarized by Tomomi Yamaguchi in “The ‘History Wars’ and the ‘Comfort Women’ Issue: Revisionism and the Right-wing in Contemporary Japan and the U.S.,” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus 18:6:3 (15 March 2020).

⁷ On the useful distinction of the four terrains of memory and their respective agents see Carol Gluck, “Operations of Memory: ‘Comfort Women’ and the World,” Sheila Miyoshi Jager and Rana Mitter, eds., Ruptured Histories: War, Memory, and the Post-Cold War in Asia (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard UP, 2007) 47–77.

⁸ See The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus special issue “The ‘Comfort Women’ as Public History” (March 2021) as well as Pyong Gap Min, Thomas R. Chung, and Sejung Sage Yim, eds., The Transnational Redress Movement for the Victims of Japanese Military Sexual Slavery (Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter, 2020).

⁹ Of course, nationalist interpretations can also occur on the side of the defendants of the statue.

¹⁰ Elizabeth W. Son, Embodied Reckonings: “Comfort Women,” Performance, and Transpacific Redress (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2018) 161.

¹¹ Linda Hasunuma and Mary M. McCarthy, “Creating a Collective Memory of the Comfort Women in the USA,” International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society 32:2 (2019) 148.

¹² See Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (bpb.de), “Interview mit Shermin Langhoff: Die Herkunft spielt keine Rolle – ‘Postmigrantisches’ Theater im Ballhaus Naunynstraße” [Interview with Shermin Langhoff: Origin does not matter – ‚Postmigrant' Theater at Ballhaus Naunynstraße] (10 March 2011). For academic accounts using the term “postmigrant society” see Naika Foroutan, Die postmigrantische Gesellschaft. Ein Versprechen der pluralen Demokratie [Post-Migrant Society: A Promise of Plural Democracy] (Berlin: Transcript Verlag, 2018). And in English see Naika Foroutan, “Post-Migrant Society,” Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (21 April 2015).

¹³ Although there is a lot to say about the statues in Dresden and Munich, for the sake of brevity this article will only deal with the statue in Berlin, with articles about Dresden and Munich to follow.

¹⁴ On the symbolism of the Statue of Peace see also Nataly Jung-Hwa Han, ed., “My Little Statue of Peace around the World” (Berlin: Korea Verband e.V., date not noted) 14-23.

¹⁵ Pyŏn Chin-il, “‘Ososugiru ‚Berurin ianfuzō‘ tekkyo yōsei no jimintō yūshi gi'in no seimeibun: Kōka wa aru no ka?” 遅すぎる「ベルリン慰安婦像」撤去要請の自民党有志議員の声明文 効果 はあるのか？ [Too Late: Statement by LDP Diet members Calling for Removal of Berlin Comfort Women Statues: Will it Work?]“ Yahoo News (21 November 2020).

¹⁶ For example, Nembutsu Haruna, “Shōjozō wa doitsu de ukeirerareta no ka: gimon no saki ni miete kita mono 少⼥像はドイツで受け⼊れられたのか 疑問の先に⾒えてきたもの [Is the Statue of Peace accepted in Germany? What we can see beyond this question],” Mainichi (11 April 2021).

¹⁷ Korea Verband, “About Us” (Berlin: Korea Verband).

¹⁸ For more information on the project, see Exchange Program for Regional Integration in East Asia and Europe (Berlin: Korea-Verband) and the video summary “EPRIE 2017” (Berlin: Korea-Verband, 15 February 2018).

¹⁹ In the ten months that I have attended the meetings of WGCF, almost every time there were new participants. Therefore, every session started with a round of self-introductions. This was in part triggered by the heightened media attention after the district's order to remove the statue. The participants are of diverse ethnic and national backgrounds and display a variety of personal interests and circumstances that motivated them to join the group. For example, some of them are students or scholars of East-Asian history and have a primarily educational or academic interest. Others have been interns at Korea Verband and stayed in the group ever since. Some have been in the group for 30 years, while others have joined only recently. Some have South Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese, or Chinese roots; others have no background of migration.

²⁰ The full list (Die Mitglieder des Bündnisses für die Friedensstatue in Deutschland) of the alliance supporting the Statue of Peace is available at the website of Working Group “Comfort Women”.

²¹ Daniel Schumacher, “Asia's global memory wars and solidarity across borders: diaspora activism on the ‘comfort women’ issue in the United States,” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus 19:5:6 (1 March 2021).

²² Quoted from International Women* Space, “About Us”. The full program of the Action Week against Femicide and Sexualized Violence is available at “4. Aktionswoche gegen Femizid und sexualisierte Gewalt, 02.- 14. August 2021” (in German).

²³ For more on the Korean Council see “About Us.” Note that until 2018 the Korean Council was called Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan. For more on the Women's Active Museum on War and Peace (WAM) see “About Us.”

²⁴ Feminism, anti-racism and decolonization are combined into the single concept of “cosmopolitanism” by Hasunuma and McCarthy in “Creating a Collective Memory of the Comfort Women in the USA” 150.

²⁵ See, for example, Alexandra Bauer, “To free oneself from this inflexible sense of belonging…”. Transnational biographies and multiple senses of belonging among South Korean women in Germany. EPRIE Journal for Regional Integration in East Asia and Europe 2017 (“Migration, Integration, and Belonging”) 10-12, and her monography “Von dieser verkniffenen Zugehörigkeit frei machen…,” Transnationale Lebensgeschichten und Mehrfachzugehörigkeiten unter südkoreanischen Frauen in Deutschland (Berlin: Weißensee Verlag Berlin, 2017).

²⁶ The exhibition entitled “MuEon DaEon | Sprachlos Vielstimmig” (MuEon DaEon | Speechless Polyphonic) opened in January 2019 and is currently closed for redesigning. Its topic was sexual violence in war and peace, with a focus on “comfort women.” Besides the “comfort stations” of the Japanese military, the exhibition showed several comparable cases of sexual violence against women in war, such as German military brothels, sexual violence committed by allied soldiers after WWII, sexual violence in the Vietnam War committed by South Korean soldiers as well as contemporary events like the case of Yazidi women, who were sexually enslaved by Daesh. See the official MuEon DaEon website and the introduction of the museum on the website of Korea Verband.

²⁷ Interview by the author, 10 November 2020.

²⁸ Ibid.

²⁹ Ibid.

³⁰ For Germany, Korea Verband has compiled a (non-exhaustive) list of interventions by the Japanese embassy: “Interventionsversuche durch die Japanische Botschaft gegen eine Friedensstatue in Deutschland” (Intervention attempts by the Japanese Embassy against a peace statue in Germany).

³¹ Kevin Scheerschmidt, “Japanische Reflexe” [Japanese reflexes], Süddeutsche Zeitung (13 August 2019); Janine Muckermann, “Ein Tabu geht auf Reisen. ‘Trostfrauen’ im Asien-Pazifik-Krieg” [A taboo goes on the road. ‘Comfort Women’ in the Asia-Pacific War], monopol Magazin für Kunst und Leben (21 August 2018). In English see David McNeill, “Freedom Fighting: Nagoya's censored art exhibition and the ‚comfort women' controversy,” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus 17:20:3 (15 October 2019).

³² See Raissa Robles, “‘Comfort women’ statue missing in the Philippines as Japan's wartime legacy under focus,” This Week in Asia (14 February 2021); Rappler.com, “Comfort woman statue in Manila removed,” Rappler.com (28 April 2018).

³³ Korea Verband, “Antrag auf Sondernutzung für Kunst im Stadtraum. Die Friedensstatue” [Application for Special Use for Art in Urban Space: The Peace Statue] (19 February 2020). On file with the author.

³⁴ Ibid.

³⁵ See English translation oft he German Wikipedia page „Wir haben Gesichter“ [We Have Faces].

³⁶ JMD, “reUnion! Von der Reanimation eines Platzes in Moabit-West” [reUnion! About the crime-reduction program for a square in Moabit-West] (2018).

³⁷ The local Working Group “reUnion” initially supported the statue, but withdrew after witnessing the reaction of the Japanese embassy.

³⁸ Korea Verband, “Antrag auf Sondernutzung für Kunst im Stadtraum. Die Friedensstatue.”

³⁹ Personal communication with the author, 11 July 2021.

⁴⁰ The full program can be accessed on the website of Korea Verband.

⁴¹ Read more about the Ravensbrück Memorial Museum here. For more information on Nazi sexual slavery, see the publications of Insa Eschebach, Regina Mühlhäuser, and Robert Sommer. The former two are regularly invited to speak at events related to “comfort women” and the Statue of Peace, e.g., at a panel discussion at the ethnographic museum in Dresden and at an exhibition in Munich, both in July 2021.

⁴² Some of these sex slaves also came from the camp in Auschwitz.

⁴³ Ha modified the word Trostfrauen (“comfort women”) to Trotzfrauen (defiant women) in order to honor their fight for acknowledgement.

⁴⁴ See Kyodo News, “Japan regrets new Korean ‘comfort women’ statue set up in Berlin” (29 September 2020). Japanese names are written in the Japanese order with the surname first.

⁴⁵ The issue of “comfort women” is not only an issue between Japan and South Korea. It involves all countries and regions from which women were recruited, including China, Taiwan, Southeast Asia, islands in the Pacific, the Netherlands, Australia, Okinawa, and other parts of Japan. It will surely eventually also involve the “comfort women” of the DPRK (North Korea).

⁴⁶ Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (MOFA), “Japan's Efforts on the Issue of Comfort Women” (27 December 2021). (Note: the statement has been updated in December 2021).

⁴⁷ Ibid.

⁴⁸ Ibid.

⁴⁹ For example Yoshimi, Yoshiaki. Comfort Women: Sexual Slavery in the Japanese Military During World War II (New York: Columbia UP, 2002).

⁵⁰ See Radhika Coomaraswamy, “Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Ms. Radhika Coomaraswamy, in accordance with Commission on Human Rights resolution 1994/45” (Geneva: United Nations, 1996). Also see Women's Active Museum (WAM), “Compilation of Recommendations by the UN Human Rights Bodies on the ‘Comfort Women’ Issue,” Appendix No. 1 of Japan/Alternative Report: On the Issue of Japan's Military Sexual Slavery (May 2014).

⁵¹ A statement demanding the demolition of the Berlin statue, which was sent to district mayor Stephan von Dassel on 18 October 2020 was signed by merely 82 of more than 800 diet members. There were no signatories from other parties beyond the LDP, and make up only one fourth of the LDP. (Pyŏn 2020, “Ososugiru ‘Berurin ianfuzō‘ tekkyo yōsei”).

⁵² Yamamoto Yumiko of the far-right group Nadeshiko Action Japanese Women for Justice and Peace (Nadeshiko Akushon Japanese Women for Justice and Peace) sent a “plea to the district mayor of Berlin-Mitte and to all Berliners” to remove the statue. In it, she spreads anti-Korean hate and uses ad hominem arguments against Korea Verband, Korean Council, and Koreans in general. (Her accusation that all Koreans are “liars” is only the tip of the iceberg). Yamamoto is the former vice-president of Zaitokukai, the ultranationalist hate group opposing basic human rights for resident Koreans (i.e., Zainichi Koreans). “Zaitokukai” is short for Zainichi Tokken o Yurusanai Shimin no Kai (Citizens Against the Special Privileges of Zainichi Foreign Residents. For more on Zaitokukai, see articles at The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, such as Jackie Kim-Wachutka, “When Women Perform Hate Speech: Gender, Patriotism, and Social Empowerment in Japan,” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus 17:11:1 [1 June 2019]). For more context on Nadeshiko Action see Japan-U.S. Feminist Network for Decolonization (FeND): Nadeshiko Action.

⁵³ See Sankei Shimbun, “Nichidoku gaishō ga kyūkyo denwa kaidan e: Chūgoku to no Keizai kankei jūshi kara tankan. Ianfuzō no tekkyo mo motomeru” [Foreign ministers of Japan and Germany hold hurried phone talks, shift focus from economic ties with China, and call for removal of comfort women statue], Sankei Shimbun (1 October 2020).

⁵⁴ While the German Foreign Office has not publicly taken an official position, it insists that “at no time has [it] made recommendations to the responsible Berlin authorities on how to deal with the statue there” (Sven Hansen, “Kein Schlussstrich. Konflikt um Berliner Mahnmal” [No drawing a line under the past: Conflict over Berlin memorial], die tageszeitung (14 October 2020).

⁵⁵ The Senate of Berlin was at the time headed by Governing Mayor Michael Müller, SPD, in a coalition of SPD, the Left, and The Greens. See Sven Hansen, “Tokio gegen Frauenstatue in Berlin. Umgang mit sexualisierter Kriegsgewalt” [Tokyo against women's statue in Berlin: Dealing with sexualized war violence], in die tageszeitung (7 October 2020); and Alexander Fröhlich, Lorenz Maroldt, “Verantwortung ‚für die Sicherheitslage in Ostasien'. Senatskanzlei drängte auf Abbau der Berliner ‚Friedensstatue'.” Der Tagesspiegel (25 October 2020).

⁵⁶ The letter is on file with the author.

⁵⁷ Similar to the situation in the Senate, the district council Berlin-Mitte was run by a coalition of the SPD, the Left, and the Greens at the time.

⁵⁸ Sven Hansen, “SPD will ‘Friedensstatue’ erhalten. Trostfrauen-Mahnmal in Berlin” [SPD wants to preserve ‘Statue of Peace’: Comfort women memorial in Berlin], die tageszeitung (13 October 2020).

⁵⁹ Ibid.

⁶⁰ Women's Active Museum (WAM), “An Open letter to Mr. Stephan von Dassel, the district mayor of Mitte, Berlin,” 12 October 2020.

⁶¹ Open letter by a group of Japanese people in Berlin sent to district mayor Stephan von Dassel on 14 October 2020. On file with the author.

⁶² E-Mail sent by a group of Japanese artists in Berlin to district mayor Stephan von Dassel on 12 October 2020. On file with the author.

⁶³ Insa Eschebach and Regina Mühlhäuser, “Umkämpfte Erinnerung. Die ‘Trostfrauen’-Statue in Berlin und der Umgang mit sexueller Kriegsgewalt” [Contested Memory. The ‘Comfort Women’ Statue in Berlin and Coping with Wartime Sexual Violence], geschichte der gegenwart (14 October 2020).

⁶⁴ Hansen, “SPD will ‘Friedensstatue’ erhalten. Trostfrauen-Mahnmal in Berlin.”

⁶⁵ The motion can be accessed on the website of the Mitte district assembly: Drucksache - 2865/V.

⁶⁶ The motion can be accessed on the website of the Mitte district assembly: Drucksache - 3029/V.

⁶⁷ Stuart Hall, “The work of representation,” in Stuart Hall, ed., Representation: Cultural representations and signifying practices (London; Thousand Oaks; New Delhi: SAGE Publ., 1997) 24-26.

⁶⁸ Son, Embodied Reckonings: “Comfort Women,” Performance, and Transpacific Redress 153.

⁶⁹ Son, Embodied Reckonings: “Comfort Women,” Performance, and Transpacific Redress 157 and 170.

⁷⁰ Son writes that “After hearing of the Japanese government's request that the Palisades Park memorial be removed, Korean American organizations and citizens in twenty-two other US locations began planning additional memorials”, p. 166. Schumacher makes a similar observation regarding the installation of a “comfort women” memorial in San Francisco: “Michael Wong, a member of the CWJC, felt that official Japanese efforts to suppress commemoration had been one factor contributing to the Coalition's motivation and momentum.” (Schumacher, “Asia's global memory wars”, p. 9).

⁷¹ This included organizing protests, talking to politicians and administrative staff, and giving interviews to local and national media. There was no direct interaction between the installers of the statue and the Japanese embassy. In fact, the strategy of the embassy and of the revisionists seems to be to address every involved party except the installers themselves. This could be observed in the case of Munich as well, where the organizers only learned about the revisionist backlash from their sponsors, who received around 300 (mostly fake) e-mails from allegedly German opponents of the statue.

⁷² The panel discussion took place in Munich on 28 July 28 2021 as part of the exhibition “Art 5 – Arts and Democracy.”

⁷³ See also Son, Embodied Reckonings: “Comfort Women,” Performance, and Transpacific Redress 147-75.

⁷⁴ Omas Gegen Rechts, “Mahnwache an der Friedensstatue” [Vigil at the Statue of Peace) (13 November 2020).

⁷⁵ Berlin.de (the official website of the city of Berlin), “Berlin international: Migrationsanteil bei 35 Prozent” (35 percent of Berliners with foreign roots) (27 February 2020). (English translation available here).

⁷⁶ E-Mail communication with the author.

⁷⁷ Oral interview in April 2021.

⁷⁸ Gero Schließ, “Is Berlin's Humboldt Forum shying away from colonial history?” Deutsche Welle (14 August 2017).

⁷⁹ Fugitive frequency, episode 08, “The H Word” (August 2021).