Kenzaburo Oe Wins Okinawa Suicides Lawsuit

[Mulboyne]

[floatl][/floatl]Mainichi: Defamation suit against Kenzaburo Oe over WW2 Okinawa suicides rejected
A defamation lawsuit against Nobel Prize-winning novelist Kenzaburo Oe and a publisher over statements that military officers ordered civilians to commit mass suicide in Okinawa during World War II was rejected in the Osaka District Court on Friday. The lawsuit, filed by 91-year-old Yutaka Umezawa, a former military commander on the island of Zamami in Okinawa; and the 75-year-old younger brother of another military commander on Tokashiki Island, had demanded 20 million yen in compensation and a publishing ban on books put out by Iwanami Shoten Publishers. In handing down the ruling, Presiding Judge Toshimasa Fukami declined to rule on whether commanders had actually ordered civilians to commit suicide, but said that judging from the conditions at the time, "the former Imperial Japanese Army was deeply involved in the mass suicides," and rejected the suit...Fukami accepted that the military had been deeply involved in the suicides, noting that hand grenades had been handed out for people to commit suicide, and that there were no mass suicides on islands where the Imperial Japanese Army was not stationed...more...

[American Oyaji]

Score 1 for truth.

[sublight]

Congratulations to Ken-chan!

[Takechanpoo]

But it is also truth that this crazy Nobel prize novelist had told a bunch of junkie lies about pre-war and post-war Japanese history for a long time.

[Midwinter]

But it is also truth that this crazy Nobel prize novelist had told a bunch of junkie lies about pre-war and post-war Japanese history for a long time.

Prove it, in English... cock smoker.

[Mike Oxlong]

An Exchange on Current Affairs
Noam Chomsky debates with Oe Kenzaburo
World Literature Today, 2002, Volume 76, Issue 2, pp. 29-35


Chomsky seemed to find Oe quite a reasonable man.

http://www.chomsky.info/debates/2002----.htm

The following exchange of letters first appeared in Japanese in mid-June and mid-July in the Tokyo daily The Asahi Shimbun. English versions followed within a few days in special editions of The Asahi Shimbun and the International Herald Tribune. Professor Chomsky's letter was printed in two parts, which have now been recombined and placed between Oe's initial letter and later response. Both Oe letters were translated by Hisaaki Yamanouchi. The three letters are reprinted here, without textual alteration, through the kind permission of The Asahi Shimbun and through the valuable mediation of WLT associate contributing editor Yoshiko Fukushima of the University of Oklahoma...