Two universities, one in Osaka Prefecture and the other in Sapporo, have received letters not only demanding the dismissal of two former Asahi Shimbun reporters teaching at the schools but also threatening to plant explosives on their campuses if the two are not fired.
The two former reporters had been involved in reporting on those Korean women referred to as "comfort women" — who were forced into sexual servitude for the Imperial Japanese armed forces. In addition to its threat of violence, this vicious attempt at intimidation poses a danger to freedom of speech and academic freedom.
Tezukayama Gakuin University in Osakasayama, Osaka Prefecture, received letters on Sept. 13 demanding that it dismiss a professor who, while working as a journalist for the Asahi, wrote articles reporting on now-deceased writer Seiji Yoshida, who claimed to have worked for a labor recruitment organization in Yamaguchi Prefecture during the war and stated that he rounded up Korean women on Jeju Island of Korea to force them to serve as comfort women.