The Japanese government has been ordered to compensate World War II Chinese slave laborers in a landmark ruling which is expected to prompt a wave of similar claims.
The Niigata district court ordered the government and Rinko Corporation, a harbor transport firm, to pay a total of ?88 million (US$830,000) to the 12 plaintiffs -- 10 laborers and two relatives of another who has since died.
The laborers, who had demanded ?275 million, said they had been forcibly taken to Japan in 1944 to work at a port and railway station in Niigata. There, they endured near-starvation, received no salary and were physically abused.
The suit was one of dozens filed by former laborers seeking redress from the government and private firms which used them as slave labor. Almost all of the claims have been rejected by the courts.
Although Tokyo maintains that all compensation claims were resolved in the 1951 San Francisco peace treaty and bilateral peace accords with its Asian neighbors, the lawsuits are an uncomfortable reminder of the bitterness felt over Japan's brutal treatment of other Asians before and during the war.
Toshiyuki Kawasaki, a spokesman for Rinko, said the ruling was "inappropriate" and that the company was discussing with its lawyers the possibility of an appeal.
Hiroyuki Hosoda, the deputy cabinet secretary, said the government would study the ruling before deciding how to respond.
In 2002, a court found the government and private sector guilty for the first time of using wartime slave labor, but ordered only the companies to pay compensation. Other cases have ended with similar rulings.
Five days ago, a court in Hokkaido rejected an ?860 million compensation claim against the government and six companies by 43 Chinese wartime laborers, accepting the defendants' claim that the 20-year statute of limitations for civil compensation suits had expired.
But the judge in Niigata, Noriyoshi Katano, surprised many by rejecting the statute of limitations argument, accepting the plaintiffs' claims that they had been forcibly employed and that Rinko had failed to provide safe working conditions.
Several similar cases are being heard in courts around Japan but the Niigata laborers' success could result in a wave of similar actions.
Tens of thousands of Chinese laborers were forcibly taken to Japan before and during the war to perform manual work, often in unspeakably harsh conditions. According to some estimates, Japan forced as many as 800,000 Asians to work as wartime laborers.
Japan's refusal to pay compensation for its wartime abuses against Chinese citizens is one of several issues which continue to cloud relations between Tokyo and Beijing.
Japan on Friday deported seven Chinese nationalists who had made an audacious dawn landing on the remote Senkaku islands in the East China Sea earlier in the week. The uninhabited island chain, claimed by Japan, China and Taiwan, is surrounded by rich fishing grounds and, possibly, oilfields.
Japan decided not to take legal action against the activists, apparently in an attempt to head off what had threatened to become a diplomatic incident.
Bilateral ties were dealt a blow on New Year's Day when the Japanese prime minister, Junichiro Koizumi, visited Yasukuni shrine in Tokyo, which deifies the country's war dead, including several war criminals.
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