ABSTRACT
In recent years, harsh questions have been raised as to Japan’s war responsibility from an Asian perspective. As a nation, Japan has not really faced up to its past errors. However, little by little, protests voiced by people in Asia have changed the image that the Japanese have of their own country’s history. The first Japanese-language work to provide a many-sided discussion of the issue of the forced labor of Koreans was Park Kyung Sik’s Ch ÷osenjin Ky ÷oseirenk÷o no Kiroku (Records of the Forced Recruitment of Koreans), published in 1965. At the time, descriptions of the forced labor of Koreans and the issue of postwar compensation were being removed from Japanese history textbooks intended for middle and high school students. Now, although there are only a few lines describing Japan’s wartime treatment of its then-colony Korea, at least the topic is mentioned.1
