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| Lee Hee-ja, co-president of the Korean Council for Compensation for the Victims of World War II, poses at her office in Yongsan, central Seoul. / Korea Times photo by Lee Suh-yoon |
By Lee Suh-yoon
When Lee Hee-ja first set off on the search for her father's records 30 years ago, she did not expect it to turn into a lifelong project.
It started with a newspaper ad in 1989 looking for family members of Koreans who were mobilized for Japan's war efforts during World War II.
"I had time, having just finished raising my three children," Lee said in an interview at her office in Seoul last week. "I also wanted to prove myself to my father. Growing up, I was always blamed for my father's ill fate just for being an unlucky daughter, and not a son."
In the group, Lee found a community of others who had also grown up without a father just like her. With help, Lee gradually tracked down what happened to her father.
"In 1992, I found a military log of his death," Lee said. "It made me so mad that the Japanese government had not even bothered to inform family members of his death. Each new record led to another one and I just had to keep going."
Lee's father was forcibly drafted into Japanese military in February 1944. She was 13 months old.
He tried to avoid the draft in every way: first by toiling away in road construction sites in a "national service group," and when that failed, he went into hiding ― sneaking back into the house every few days.
"When the war reached its peak in 1943, it became almost impossible for him to refuse the draft order," Lee said. "He was also afraid his younger sister might be taken away to a Japanese military brothel if he did not comply."
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| Lee points out her traces of her father left in a Japanese military record. / Korea Times photo by Lee Suh-yoon |
Lee eventually traced her father's footsteps from a Japanese military camp in Yongsan to a sickbed where he died from battle wounds in Jiangsu Province, China.
Lee, 77, now helps others find similar records of family members who were forced to fight or work for Japan during World War II. Since 2004, Lee has headed the Korea Council for Compensation for the Victims of World War II.
"I'm not a historian or human rights lawyer, just a family member of a victim," she said. "I am experienced in digging up old records though."
There are fewer records for forced laborers compared to conscripts, Lee says. She continues to work closely with Japanese civic groups and lawyers to dig up new ones.
Lee takes special care of surviving wartime forced labor victims, most of whom are in their 90s. She keeps in frequent contact and gets them to the courtroom on the right date, acting as the main communication channel between victims and their helpers like activists and lawyers.
Her role was crucial in the lead-up to the landmark ruling last month where Korea's top court ordered a Japanese firm to compensate Korean forced laborers for the first time, according to the surviving plaintiff.
"Her continued interest in me is what brought the case this far," said Lee Chun-sik, the sole surviving victim in the Oct. 30 trial. "We would not have won this lawsuit without Lee Hee-ja's effort."
