Takashi Uemura, who first reported on the women in 1991, said he has faced allegations of fabricating the truth from right-wing critics. Speaking at New York University on Monday, Uemura said press freedom has waned in Japan when it comes to the sensitive issue of Japan's wartime past.
"The attack against me is an attack on press freedom," Uemura said, according to TheKorea Times.
The former reporter was the first to write about the issue of comfort women in Japan on August 11, 1991. Three days later, a South Korean comfort woman, Kim Hak-soon, delivered a press conference in Japan where she admitted to being subjected to relentless sexual violence in Japanese military brothels.
Kim died in 1997.
Uemura said he has come under attack for his report, which was published more than 24 years ago. His antagonists have taken aim at him and family members, he said, even mentioning his 17-year-old daughter by name.
The Korea Times reported Uemura had received death threats that read, "We will kill you even if it takes years...will kill you even if you try to escape."
The president of Hokusei Gakuen University, where Uemura teaches, has also received condemnations. Uemura said historical revisionists claimed the president was complicit with Uemura and that they would harm the students and instructors at the university if measures were not taken to remove Uemura from the campus.
In an interview with Yonhap, Uemura said Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was wrong to stop short of an apology to the comfort women during his recent state visit to Washington.
"Some deny Japan forcibly recruited comfort women, that there is no evidence," said Uemura.
"But the fact remains there was sexual slavery at the comfort stations – a clear violation of human rights."
