SEOUL, South Korea (AP) 鈥 South Korea鈥檚 top court on Thursday cleared a scholar of charges of defaming the Korean victims of sexual slavery during Japanese colonial rule, in a contentious book published in 2013.
Thursday鈥檚 ruling in the criminal case of Park Yu-ha isn鈥檛 the end of her long-running legal battle, as she faces a separate civil suit filed by ex-sex slaves. She鈥檚 suffered harsh public criticism over her book 鈥淐omfort Women of the Empire,鈥 triggering debates over the scope of freedom of speech in South Korea.
In 2017, the Seoul High Court fined Park, an emeritus professor at Seoul鈥檚 Sejong University, 10 million won ($7,360) over some of the expressions she used in her book to describe Korean women who were as sex slaves for Japan鈥檚 troops during the first half of the 20th century.
But the Supreme Court ruled Thursday it was difficult to determine those expressions constituted criminal defamation, saying it was more appropriate to assess them as Park鈥檚 academic arguments or expression of her personal opinions.
The court said that 鈥渞estrictions on the freedom of academic expressions must be minimal.鈥 It still said that when scholars publicize their studies, they must strive to protect others鈥 privacy and dignity and to respect their freedom and rights to self-determination.
Prosecutors and Park鈥檚 critics earlier accused her of defaming ex-sex slaves by writing that they were proud of their jobs and had comrade-like relationships with Japanese soldiers while the Japanese military wasn鈥檛 officially involved in the forceful mobilization of sex slaves.
The Supreme Court said it sent Park鈥檚 case back to the Seoul High Court to make a new ruling on her. The procedure means that Park will be declared not guilty at the high court unless new evidence against her come out, according to Supreme Court officials.
Park welcomed the ruling. 鈥淚 think today鈥檚 verdict is a ruling about whether the freedom of thought exists in Republic of Korea,鈥 she wrote on Facebook.
In a separate civil suit, a Seoul district court in 2016 ordered Park to pay 10 million won ($7,360) each to nine of the ex-Korean sex slaves who sued her. An appellate trial on that case is still under way, according to media reports.
Sexual slavery is a highly emotional issue in South Korea, where many still harbor strong resentment against the 1910-45 Japanese colonial occupation.
Historians say tens of thousands of women from around Asia, many of them Koreans, were sent to front-line military brothels to provide sex to Japanese soldiers. which was used in the title of Park's book, is an euphemism for the sex slaves.
Japan in 1993 after a government investigation concluded many women were taken against their will and 鈥渓ived in misery under a coercive atmosphere.鈥 However, there has been a strong backlash from South Korea and elsewhere to comments by Japanese politicians who spoke about a lack of documentary proof the women were forcibly recruited, in an apparent attempt to gloss over Tokyo's wartime atrocities.
