FOCUS

Focus
Asia-PacificNewsletter of the Asia-Pacific Human Rights Information Center (HURIGHTS OSAKA)

September 2015 Vol. 81

Contents

Editorial

Right to Land and the Ainu
This article presents the historical bases on
why the Ainu should be recognized asindigenous people and why their rights toland should be properly respected.
- Chisato Abe
Page 2

Non-recognition

Beyond the Present Ainu Policy:
emancipating the Ainu from subordination toJapan
A critical examination of the current
Japanese government policy regarding the
Ainu policy, this article explains theprevailing view in government that led tolimited recognition of the rights of the Ainu.
- Hiroshi Maruyama
Page 5
Human Rights and Cyber Hate Speech: The
Case of the Ainu
This article exposes the social media-based
hate speech against the Ainu and aimed atwithdrawing the government recognition of
the Ainu as indigenous people.
- ann-elise lewallen
Page 9More Care, Less Tragedy: Left-behindChildren in China
This is a report on the situation of childrenof migrant workers who are left at home
and who suffer many problems as a result.
- Xu Zhen
Page 13

Indigenous peoples the world over call for the full recognition of
their right to exist as indigenous peoples and to enjoy their manyother rights. Unfortunately, many countries in Asia and thePacific have failed to give proper recognition of the rights ofindigenous peoples.
Such non-recognition is almost tantamount to denying theinjustice suffered in the past by the indigenous peoples, toallowing the continuing loss of their land and natural resourceson which they depend upon for survival, to continuation ofviolence they suffer from those grabbing their ancestral
territories for financial gain, to the perpetuation of many forms of
discrimination they are being subjected to, and to themaintenance of the marginalization they endure because they
are treated as less than equal by many people in the country.
Recently, at least in the case of the Ainu in Japan, the digitalsocial media and other forms of communication have been used
to malign the indigenous peoples and deny their rights. Such
media assaults are seen as another examples of hate speech.
Who knows what this new form of harassment of the indigenous
peoples would lead to.

1

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFCSEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81

Right to Land and the Ainu
Chisato Abe

I

mmediately after the results of
the April 2015 local elections
gave her a fourth term as
Governor of Hokkaido, Harumi
Takahashi spoke on televisionand said “we are planning tohold a big event to celebrate
Hokkaido’s 150th anniversary in
2019.” This statement raised
issues on the history of the
Ainu. This means that only one
hundred forty-six years havepassed since a portion of the
A i n u ’s n a t i v e l a n d w a s
unilaterally named “Hokkaido.”
Only sixty-eight years havepassed since the Hokkaido
government was authorized in1947 to operate as a regularprefectural government.
Additionally, this statement
reminded the Ainu that theconversion of Hokkaido’s legal
status to that of a prefecture wasmade without their consent.
In claiming territorial rights in
Hokkaido and even the
Northern territories or so-called“ H o p p o u R yo u d o ,” t h egovernment of Japan has to face
the historical fact ofcolonization of the Ainu land
and thus also the reality thatsuch claim is not based onconsent from the Ainu.
Hokkaido History
The Ainu culture evolved
starting with the Satsumon
culture1 in the mid-12th century
and continued evolving in the
13th century. The traditional
settlement area of the Ainu

people, referred to as“Ainumosir,” includes what are
now known as Southern
Sakhalin, the Kurile Islands andHokkaido. The Ainu wereoriginally a trading people,
using goods obtained throughhunting, gathering and fishing.
Interactions between the Wajin,
name referring to the current
ethnic majority in Japan, and
the Ainu occurred in earlier
times as well. Although there
were wars between the Ainu
and the Wajin regarding tradeissues, they had relatively good
relations for a long period oftime. The Ainu called the Wajin“sisam,” which means “goodneighbors" in Ainu language.
From 1720, however, thesituation started to change. The
Matsumae Clan2 was graduallyable to occupy many parts of
Hokkaido and imposed the“subcontracting system.” Under
this system, Wajin merchants
who paid business taxes to the
Matsumae Clan were entrustedwith the management of the
trading posts in Hokkaido. The
exploitation of the Ainu by the
Wajin merchants under thissystem gradually weakened theunity of the Ainu as acom mun i ty o f i n d i g e n o u speople.
Colonization Commission
A Colonization Commission,
established in 1869, unilaterally
changed the name of the islandt o “ H o k k a i d o .” A f t e r t h e2establishment of theColonization Commission, thegovernment of Japan became
serious in treating the island as
state-owned.
Modern land reform in
Hokkaido started in 1872. The
Colonization Commission
adopted several regulations
including the “Land Regulation”
that forced the Ainu toassimilate to the Japanesesociety, or become “Japanized.”
The regulations forced the Ainu
to use Japanese names, banned
women’s tattoos, men’s earrings,
and the traditional Ainu custom
of burning the family home andmoving elsewhere after thedeath of a family member.
Using Article 15 of theOrdinance for Issuing Land
Certificates, the Colonization
Commission declared in 1877
the forests and wilderness in
Hokkaido as state owned. Shinichiro Takakura, a professor of
Hokkaido University, explained
this situation:3
Most of Hokkaido’s land wasleft unused, relinquished.
Therefore, land ownership in
Hokkaido was in total chaos.
With the property
relationships being
ambiguous, the modern land
reform was employed as aprocess of building clear
legal relationships. The
ambiguous property
relationships in Hokkaido led
to the disposition of stateowned unexplored territory

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
and the issuance of land
certifications.

However, the assertion of“ambiguous property
relationships in Hokkaido” inlate 19th century is not proper.
The Ainu concept of land use atthat time was certainly different
from that of the Japanese. To the
Ainu, land use was not only forthe commercial purpose ofbuying and selling property. It
was a comprehensive concept
consisting of fishing, hunting,cultivation and other land uses.4
Even under the notorious“subcontracting system,” theAinu were the ones who used
the forest and other resourcesfrom the land to make theirproducts. The Wajin merchantsbought and re-sold theseproducts at unconscionableprofit. This attitude of notr e c o g n i z i n g t h e A i n u ’s
relationship with the land andnot recognizing the correctnessof what they do should becalled “colonialism.”
Hokkaido Autonomy
While the government of Japan
has never recognized Hokkaido
as a “former colony,” the historyof governance of Hokkaido is
all
about
colonial
administration.
The pre-World War II Japanese
territory was supposed toconsist of “Japan proper” and“overseas territories.” Thecategory of a territory wasdependent on the “special
circumstances” existing in theplace. An important difference
between “Japan proper” and an“overseas territory” — which
was referred to as “colony” until
1929—was whether or not
Japanese law would apply to

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
the territory. The “special
circumstances” were, forexample, the level of educationof the inhabitants on Japanesecustoms, culture, etc., level ofdevelopment, and lack of landownership system. An “overseas
territory” often had “oldh i s t o r y,” “ n a t i v e s ,” asignificantly different physicalenvironment, and “unique
ethnic customs and socials t r u c t u r e .” T h e “ s p e c i a lcircumstances” of an “overseas
territory” made it difficult for
the laws of Japan to properly
apply.5 The government in the
territory had to judge whichlaws to apply to the land basedon the level of “special
circumstances” in the place.
Thus it can be said that an“overseas territory” referred tothe territory governed by laws
other than those applicable inJapan proper.
“Special Circumstances” in
Hokkaido
The 1854 Treaty of Shimoda(Russo-Japanese Friendship
Pact) was approved without theconsent of the Ainu. Under thistreaty, the government of Japandeclared the Ainu as Japanesepeople. The treaty designatedthe Kuril Islands boundary to be
drawn at the Uruppu waterway,
and Sakhalin was designated asa shared living area, where
nationals of both countries
might live. There was never any
consultation with the Ainu
regarding Hokkaido’s land
rights issues before and after thesigning of the treaty.
The 1889 Election Law that
granted the right to vote toJapanese men who had been
paying general tax of fifteen Yenor more and at least twenty-five3

years old was not applicable in
Hokkaido, Okinawa, and theBonin Islands.6 Additionally, theamended land law7 thatallowed foreigners to own landin the country was also notapplicable in Hokkaido.
A f t e r Wo r l d Wa r I I , t h e
Hokkaido government, whichused to have stronger authority
as Colonization Commission,
became a regular prefectural
government. The Colonization
Commission, having theauthority to choose which laws
should apply to Hokkaido,
considered the “Hokkaido
Former Aborigines Protection
Act” as a special law for the
Ainu, and suspended
fundamental rights such as theright to vote. The Colonization
Commission did not have a
local legislative body and anelected governor. With theprefectural government sytem,
the election of Hokkaido
governor, municipal mayors,
members of local councils, andmembers of the Japanese Diet
was held for the first time in
1947.
These historical facts should beconsidered “special
circumstances” that support theconclusion that Hokkaido wasinitially considered an“overseas territory;” and whose
status was converted into aregular prefecture without the
Ainu’s consent.
Ainu’s Indigenous Rights toLand and Other Resources
Based on Article 26 of theUnited Nations Declaration on
the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples, the Ainu should enjoy
the right to land, territories, andresources.8 The Ainu

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFC
Association of Hokkaido in astatement submitted to theEighth Session of the Working
Group on Indigenous
Populations in 1990 asserted
that9in the light of the history [ofplunder of] Hokkaido andother territories by theJapanese government
without any agreement with
the Ainu who were living
there, we maintain we havethe right to claim back theselands and resources. In
addition, we also haveeconomic rights regarding
hunting, gathering andfishing in these resources.

In 1997, the Sapporo District
Court in the Nibutani Dam caseruled that the status of“…‘indigenous peoples’ should
certainly apply” to the Ainu.10
This was the first recognition of
the Ainu as indigenous people
by one of the three holders of
power of the Japanese state.
The concept of “regeneration of
traditional living space (iwor)”a d o p t e d by t h e A dv i s o r yCommittee on the Future
Measures for Ainu People in1996 should be considered agovernment policy regarding the
Ainu’s right to land. The Advisory
Council for Future Ainu Policy
adopted the same concept in its
2009 report.11 In this case, theAinu Association of Hokkaido,
the biggest organization of
Ainu, could have asserted in theAdvisory Council the Ainu’s
right to land in line with Article
26 of the United Nations
Declaration on the Rights ofIndigenous Peoples. But it could
not yet do so.
The House of Representatives
and the House of Councilors

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
unanimously adopted the“Resolution to Recognize the
Ainu as an Indigenous People”
on 6 June 2008. In response,
the Chief Cabinet Secretary
expressed the government’s
position in his statement on thesame day: 12
Not only will the government
further enhance the Ainu
policies taken so far, but it
will make efforts to establish
comprehensive policy
measures, in reference torelevant clauses of the UN[United Nations] Declarationon the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples, with the recognition
that the Ainu are an
indigenous people who have
lived around the northernpart of the JapaneseArchipelago, especially in
Hokkaido, with a uniquelanguage as well as religious
and cultural distinctiveness.

On 13 June 2014, the Cabinet
adopted the “Basic Policy for
the Development, Management
and Operation of Symbolic
Space for Ethnic Harmony.”
One of the most important
provisions of this policy is on
the planned museum to becalled Symbolic Space forEthnic Harmony.13
However, the acknowledgment
by all three state powers inJapan of the Ainu as indigenous
people has not yet led to thediscussion of their rights as
indigenous people. Worse,
some argue that the Ainu
cannot have collective rights.
There is still much work to do
for the government of Japan toshow its acceptance of thevalue to the Ainu of the United
Nations Declaration of theRights of Indigenous Peoples.

4

Chisato Abe is a representativeof Ainu Indigenous Peoples Film
Society.
For further information, pleasecontact: Chisato Abe, e-mail:ainu_ips_filmfest@yahoo.co.jp; http://ainuindigenouspeoplesfilmfest.blogsp
ot.jp and www.facebook.com/
ainuindigenouspeoplesfilmfest.

Endnotes
1 The Satsumon culture wasone of the cultures in
Hokkaido from the 7th to the12th century, see Hokkaido’s
History, Culture and Nature,w w w. a k a r e n g a - h . j p / e n /hokkaido/jomon/j-05/.
2 The Matsumae clan was
granted by the Japanesemilitary rulers (shogunate)
during the Edo era theauthority to govern an areaaround the southern part of
Hokkaido.
3 S h i n - i c h i r o Ta k a k u r a ,Hokkaido Nouchi Kaitaku-shi[History of Land System in
Hokkaido], Hokkaido Nochi
Kaikaku Shi [Hokkaido’
History of agricultural land
reform] Hokkaido,1954,
page13.
4. Tadashi Takizawa, Meiji-Shoki
Kaitaku-shi no Tochi-Kaikaku
to Ainu no Tochi: Omoni
Hokkaido-Jisho-Kisoku Dai-7jo wo megutte [Land Reformof the Colonial Commissionin Early Meiji Era and theLand of the Ainu],” Hokudaishigaku (51), The Journal of
Historical Association of
Hokkaido University, 2011,
page 3.
5. H i d e a k i U e m u ra , A i n u Minzoku no “Ryodo-ken” toS h o k u m i n - ch i H o k k a i d o[Territorial Right of the Ainu

(Continued on page 15)

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFCSEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81

Beyond the Present Ainu Policy: emancipating the
Ainu from subordination to Japan
Hiroshi MaruyamaT

he results of the 2015
screening of new textbooks
for junior secondary school
students in Japan provokedcriticism. The new textbooks
falsified the Ainu history, whichis reflective of the present Ainu
policy of Japan. There is fearthat these textbooks would givethe majority Japanese a wrong
historical view of the Ainu. Thisa r t i c l e d i s c u s s e s A i n u ’s
indigeneity and their collective
rights in the present Ainu policy
to explore an alternative policy.
Present Ainu Policy
The present Ainu policy is traced
back to the replacement of the1 8 9 9 H o k k a i d o Fo r m e r
Aborigines Protection Act withthe so-called Ainu Culture
Promotion Act (CPA) of 1997.
The drafting of the CPA wasbased on the 1996 report of theAdvisory Committee on the
Future Measures for Ainu
People. The 2009 Final Reportof the second advisory body,
Advisory Council for Future
Ainu Policy, established under
the CPA, led to theestablishment of the Council for
Ainu Policy Promotion which
was tasked “to comprehensively
and effectively promote Ainu
p o l i cy, t a k i n g v i e w s a n dopinions of Ainu people into
consideration.” 1 The sevenmembers of the first advisory
council (Advisory Committee on
the Future Measures for Ainu

People) were all Japanese, while
the second one (Advisory
Council for Future Ainu Policy)
was made up of seven Japaneseand only one Ainu. It can besaid that the Ainu have basically
been excluded from the present
Ainu policymaking.
In 2007, Japan reluctantly voted
for the United Nations
Declaration on the Rights ofIndigenous Peoples. In 2008,
the Diet passed in a hurry aresolution on the Ainu just amonth before the G8 summit in
Hokkaido. It recommended to
the government to recognize
the Ainu as an indigenous
people in the northern part of
the Japanese Archipelago in
p a r t i c u l a r H o k k a i d o . Th egovernment immediately
accepted the resolution.
However, the CPA, the only
existing legislation for the Ainu,
d o e s n o t r e f e r t o A i n u ’s
indigeneity and their rights.
Against this backdrop, thegovernment maintains the
position that it cannot conclude
whether or not the Ainu areamong the indigenous peoples
stipulated in international
instruments and, consequently,
has no idea of what their rights
are. A scrutiny of the twoadvisory councils’ reports
explains the situation.

5

Perception of Ainu’s Indigeneity
The 1996 report of the firstadvisory council describes the
Ainu as follows:2
From the historical
viewpoint, it cannot bedenied that Ainu persons are
indigenous to the northernpart of the JapaneseArchipelago in particular
Hokkaido, a territory that is
an inherent part of Japan.

But historians do not support
this view as seen in thisstatement: “The state of Japanwas founded in the end of theseventh century based on thewestern part of theArchipelago…Hokkaido and
Ryukyu were outside of Japan
until the middle of thenineteenth century.”3 The firstadvisory council was supposed
to take advantage of thearchaeological evidence that
Jomon people lived more thanten thousand years ago as thefi r s t i n h a b i t a n t s i n t h eArchipelago, including
Hokkaido. In fact, “the region
where Jomon culture prevailed
almost overlaps the present
territory of Japan. However, wecannot treat equally thedemarcation of Jomon culture
and the border of Japan withneighbouring countries.”4 Since
the end of the Jomon period ataround 300 BC, Hokkaido,
Ryukyu and Japan had been
distinct from each other until

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
the latter’s colonization of
Hokkaido and Ryukyu. Overall,archaeological, anthropologicaland historical evidence support
the view that “the Ainu, theRyukyuan and the Japanese
have their roots in Jomon
people, and that they have had
their own histories andrecognized each other asdifferent ethnic groups.”5 The
second advisory council
repeated the view of the firstadvisory council in stating thatthe “Ainu people have lived
around the northern part of theJapanese Archipelago,
especially in Hokkaido, as aninherent territory of Japan.”6
With regard to the perception of
Ainu’s indigeneity, there is nodifference between the twoadvisory councils. The usage ofthe term “inherent territory ofJapan” for Hokkaido implies
that “the Ainu and the ethnic
Japanese comprise a single
identity of ‘Japan’, of which
they are both a part.”7 Thus thetwo advisory councils
encouraged the government to“emphasize the non-indigenous
characteristics of the Ainu sothat they are treated the same asother minority groups.”8 This
resulted in the CPA’s nonrecognition of the Ainu’s
indigeneity, despite existing
international criteria on
indigenous peoples. The samecolonial discourse is expressedby Tanimoto Akihisa, historianat the Center for Ainu andIndigenous Studies of Hokkaido
University in Yahoo! News
Japan on 3 March 2015.9 Heviews the Ainu culture as one of
the traditional cultures peculiar
to Japan along with Japaneseculture and Ryukyu Okinawa
culture. He denies the historicalfact that the Ainu had

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
developed distinct language
and culture on their own
outside of Japan’s territory prior
to Japan’s colonization of Ainu
land, and that the Ainu have
handed down their culture fromgeneration to generation until
today despite discriminatory
conditions. Thus he misleads
the public into supporting theabove-mentioned CPA.
Perception of Ainu’s Rights
Close examination of the twoadvisory councils’ reports
shows that both councils neverdiscussed how to protect Ainu’s
rights or the collective rights of
the Ainu in accordance withinternational human rights
norms, though both had lawyers
as members. This is seen in the
CPA which has no provision on
any collective right of the Ainu.
As a consequence, the United
Nations (UN) human rights
treaty bodies have expressed
concerns and provided
recommendations to theJapanese government in theirconcluding observations on the
periodic reports of Japan. For
instance, the Human Rights
Committee (HRC) of theInternational Covenant on the
Civil and Political Rights(ICCPR) stated in August 2014:“The State party should takefurther steps to revise its
legislation and fully guarantee
the rights of Ainu, Ryukyu andOkinawa communities to theirtraditional land and natural
resources.”10 Simultaneously,
the Committee on the
Elimination of Racial
Discrimination (CERD) of theInternational Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of
Racial Discrimination
recommended to Japan todrastically change the present

6

Ainu policy by, among others,
adopting “appropriate measures
to protect the rights of the Ainu
people to land and natural
resources, and to foster the
implementation of measures
aimed at the realization of theirright to culture and language.”11
Teruki Tsunemoto, the Directorof the Center for Ainu andIndigenous Studies who has
been involved in Japan’s Ainu
policymaking for many years as
key constitutional lawyer,
defends the present Ainu policyby saying that the Ainu do notconform to the definition of theindigenous peoples who areentitled to enjoy selfdetermination and land under
the United Nations Declarationon the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples (UNDRIP). He further
insists:12
It is unacceptable for the
Ainu themselves to decide
whether or not someone isan Ainu who can receive
benefits from the authorities
concerned. Indigenous
rights, including the right toland and language, arecollective, and so they
contradict the individualbased human rights in thelegal system of Japan. Basedon the [2009] Final Report,
the Ainu should be called an
ethnic minority withindigeneity rather than an
indigenous people. The
present Ainu policy should
be maintained anddeveloped within Japanesejurisprudence, because
Article 13 of the Constitution
enables Ainu persons to live
a life with their identity as
Ainu.

In sum, he confines the conceptof Ainu’s indigeneity and theirFOCUS ASIA-PACIFC
rights to the Japanese context.
In fact, both advisory councils
helped the government todisregard Article 27 of the
ICCPR and Article 15 of theInternational Covenant on the
Economic, Social and Cultural
Rights (ICESCR) to which Japanis a State party, that ensure thecollective rights of indigenous
peoples, including the Ainu.
Collective Rights of the Ainu
The international community
supports the view that “[N]osingle definition could capture
the diversity of indigenous
peoples worldwide…[and] it
was not desirable or possible toarrive at a universal
definition.” 13 Instead of auniversal definition, the UN
recognizes the indigenous
peoples’ right to selfidentification or the power todecide who belongs to them byreferring to the following
criteria:14• Historical continuity withpre-colonial and/or presettler societies;• Strong link to territories
and surrounding natural
resources;• Distinct social, economic
or political systems;• Distinct language, culture
and beliefs;• Fo r m n o n - d o m i n a n tgroups of society;• Resolve to maintain andreproduce ancestralenvironments and systems
as distinctive peoples andcommunities.
These criteria add to theinternationally recognized
criteria provided byInternational Labour

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
Organization (ILO) Convention
No. 169 and Martinéz Cobo
Report to the UN SubCommission on the Preventionof Discrimination of Minorities.
In the process of drafting the
UNDRIP, “Japan was one of thestrongest critics as many of thearticles contradicted theg o v e r n m e n t ’s s t a n c e o ncollective rights.”15 An open
admission by the government of
the colonization of Ainu land
would guarantee Ainu's
indigeneity based on the UN
criteria, and would be a firststep to protecting the collective
rights of the Ainu.
In essence, indigenous peoples
enjoy their own culture, professand practice their own religion
and use their own language incommunity with othermembers. Therefore, “collective
rights are a special category ofrights that are especially
important for indigenousp e o p l e s wo r l dw i d e .” 1 6 A t
present, collective rights arederived from individual rights ofindigenous peoples and otherminorities. For example, Article
27 of the ICCPR and Article 15of the ICESCR ensure collective
rights of indigenous peoples asmentioned above.17 Even in
Japan, the Sapporo District
Court in deciding on the caseregarding the construction of
the Nibutani Dam declared that
the Ainu have the right to enjoy
their own culture as indigenous
people based on Article 27 of
the ICCPR and Article 13 of theConstitution of Japan. In otherwords,18
the Japanese court in the
Nibutani Dam Case was able
to view individual rights andcollective rights as not being

7

mutually exclusive. Viewed
in this manner, individual
rights do not necessarily
render collective rights
invalid in Japan. Despite this,in international forums theJapanese government hascontinually insisted on theirinterpretation of theconstitution that divides
collective and individual
rights into two separate
categories that cannot exist
together.

Under the Constitution of Japan,
the human rights of everyone
are equally protected. In reality,
the Constitution ensures thehuman rights of the majority
Japanese, while the Ainu, whon e e d c o l l e c t ive r i g h t s a smentioned above, are notprotected as far as maintaining
and developing their own
language and culture. In order
to confirm the equality of all
human rights, the collective
rights of the Ainu should be
immediately taken into
consideration. For instance, theAinu have no right to fish
salmon like the majority
Japanese, though salmon isindispensable for their culture.
In order to enjoy their own
culture, fishing rights should beconferred on the Ainu as aw h o l e . H o w e v e r, O c h i a i
Kenichi, constitutional lawyer at
the Centre for the Ainu andIndigenous Studies of Hokkaido
University, contends that thecollective rights of the Ainu
cannot be ensured without theconsent of the majority
Japanese.19 If so, minorities,
including the Ainu, are notprotected by the Constitution.
Human rights are universal,
inalienable and indivisible, andare unconditionally applied toeveryone across the globe. The

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
protection of minorities does
not require the majority’sendorsement. His argument is,therefore, against the corevalues of human rights. Further,
he insists that the Symbolic
Space for Ethnic Harmony
promoted by the Council for
Ainu Policy Promotion is likely
to give the majority an
opportunity to learn the history
and traditions of the Ainu. If, as
he argues, an insufficientunderstanding of the Ainu by
the majority impedes thepromotion of Ainu culture, thefirst priority should be given tocorrecting the authorized
description of the Ainu inhistory textbooks, let alone
correcting the flawed current
Ainu policy.

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
under the General Comment
No. 23 of the CERD and theGeneral Comment No. 21 of
the CESCR. Japan bears the
responsibility of observing
international human rights
instruments, including inter alia
the ICCPR, ICESCR and CERD,
in accordance with Article 98 of
the Constitution of Japan20 inorder to move forward.
Hiroshi Maruyama is a guest
professor at the Hugo Valentin
Centre, Uppsala University.
For further information, please contact:
hiroshi.maruyama0401@gmail.com.
Facebook: hiroshi maruyama 566.
Recent publications: https://muroran-it.academia.edu/
HiroshiMaruyama

Concluding Remarks
The reports of the first andsecond advisory councils,
which underlie the present Ainu
policy, helped to falsify Japan’scolonization of Ainu land in themodern and postmodern eras,
and to neglect Ainu’s rights orthe collective rights of the Ainu.
It resulted in the flawed current
Ainu policy in terms ofperception of Ainu’s indigeneity
and their rights according to theinternational human rights
norms. In order to replace thecurrent Ainu policy with a newone, the government first of all
ought to openly admit its
colonization of Ainu land andapologize to the Ainu for it.
Second, the government has torecognize the collective rightsof the Ainu in accordance withinternational human rights
n o r m s . To d ay, A i n u ’s f u l lparticipation in decisions
affecting them is guaranteedbased on the principle of free,prior and informed consent

Endnotes
1 See Council for Ainu Policy
Promotion, www.kantei.go.jp/
jp/singi/ainusuishin/index_e.h
tml#about.
2 Advisory Committee on the
Future Measures for Ainu
People, Hokokusho [Report],(Tokyo: 1996), page 2.
3 Amino, Y., Nihon toha nanika[What is Japan?] (Tokyo: Kodansha, 2000), page 26.
4 Segawa, T. Ainugaku nyumon[An introduction to Ainu studies] (Tokyo: Kodansha, 2015)
page 42.
5 Ibid., page 43.
6 Advisory Council for Future
Ainu Policy, Final Report (Tokyo: 2009), page 19.
7 Porter, C., “After the Ainu
Shinpo: The United Nations
and the Indigenous People ofJapan,” New Voices 2, 2008,
p a g e 2 1 5 . Ava i l a b l e a t
http://newvoices.jpf-sydney.or
g/2/chapter10.pdf.

88 Ibid.
9 Tanimoto, A., Yahoo! News
Japan. 3 March 2015;
http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20150303-00000005-wor
dleaf-pol (accessed on 28 July2015).
10 Human Rights Committee,
Concluding observations on
the sixth periodic report ofJapan, CCPR/C/JPN/CO/6, 20
August2014,
http://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/treatybodyexternal/Download.aspx?symbolno=CCPR%
2fC%2fJPN%2fCO%2f6&Lan
g=en (accessed 14 August2015).
11 Committee on the Eliminationof Racial Discrimination,
Concluding observations on
the combined seventh toninth periodic reports of Japan, CERD/C/JPN/CO/7-9, 26
September2014,
http://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/treatybodyexternal/Download.aspx?symbolno=CERD%
2fC%2fJPN%2fCO%2f7-9&La
ng=en (accessed 9 August2015).
12 Tsunemoto, T., “Ainuminnzoku to nihonngata senjuminzoku seisaku” [The Ainu
and Japanese model indigenous policy]”, Gakujutsu no
doko [Trend of Scholarship].
(Tokyo: Japan Science Support
Foundation, 2011) pages 8081.
13 U N G A , D i s c r i m i n a t i o n
Against Indigenous Peoples Report of the Working Groupon Indigenous Populations on
its fourteenth session,
E/CN.4/Sub.2/1996/21, 16
Au g u s t 1 9 9 6 , p a ra 2 8 . ,www.unhchr.ch/huridocda/hu
ridoca.nsf/(Symbol)/E.CN.4.Su
b.2.1996.21.En?Opendocument.
14 United Nations Permanent
Forum on Indigenous Issues,
Indigenous Peoples, Indige-(Continued on page 15)

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFCSEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81

Human Rights and Cyber Hate Speech:
The Case of the Ainu
ann-elise lewallenIn early autumn 2014, two
Hokkaido politicians engaged
in separate online attacks,questioning the veracity of the
Ainu position as indigenous
peoples and as a coherent
ethnic community in 21st
century Hokkaido. Ainu firstreceived recognition as
indigenous peoples of northern
Japan in 2008. While
recognition brought the promiseof indigenous rights and newpolitical status, it was also
accompanied by increasing
concern from conservativeinterest parties who feared thepossibility of greater legal status
for Ainu as threatening tomajority Wajin (ethnic Japanese)enjoyment of constitutionalrights. Conservative factions
have vocalized these criticisms
primarily using online forums
such as Twitter, blogs, andelected official websites, andthese online conversations havethen been channeled into
raucous street campaigns. Since
the mid-2000s, social media
sites have served as digitalforums for circulation of criticalcommentaries and hate speechagainst immigrant andminoritized communities.
Online criticism of Ainu in2014 extended from a string ofconservative attacks against
Ainu uses of public funds in2009. As discussed below, thesecyber hate speech incidents aretroubling for the state of Ainu
human rights and the possibility

that indigenous rights might beintroduced as part of planningfor future Ainu policy. At
present national Ainu policy is
being coordinated by the
Cabinet appointed Council for
Ainu Policy Promotion (Ainu
Seisaku Suishin Kaigi), withsemi-regular meetings
coordinated by the national
government in Tokyo.1
Cyber Hate Speech:
Questioning Ainu Existence
On 11 August 2014, Sapporo
City Assemblyman Yasuyuki
Kaneko posted on the microblogging site Twitter that “Ainup e o p l e n o l o n g e r e x i s t .”Specifically, Kaneko wrote,“Ainu people, of course they nolonger exist now. At most,Japanese of Ainu ancestry iswhat they are, crazily using up
concessions,
i t ’sunconscionable! How do I
explain this [excess] totaxpayers?” 2 His comments
ricocheted across Ainu
community Facebook pages,
and soon across the media,
sparking criticism and outrage
from the Ainu community andbeyond. The Ainu Association of
Hokkaido (AAH) elected not to
respond in any official fashion,
but several individual Ainu andallied scholars, both inside andoutside academic institutions,spoke out about the issue.3 By
mid-August a group of Sapporo
Ainu formed an ad hoc

9coalition, the Ainu Minzoku
Sabetsu Hatsugen o Kyumei
suru Kyodo Jikoiinkai (Ainu
Peoples’ Discriminatory Speech
Investigation Coordinating
Committee), and sent a public
letter to Kaneko on August 22
demanding an apology. Kaneko
refused to apologize anddevoted himself to exposing
what he called Ainu
misappropriation of publicfunds, rooting out examples ofcity support for Ainu and thenlambasting them on his website
and Twitter feeds.4 Kaneko’s
further tweets and refusal torecant drew condemnation fromJapan’s top political leaders,
including Chief Cabinet
Secretary and head of the
Cabinet-appointed Ainu Policy
Committee Yoshihide Suga as
well as Sapporo Mayor Fumio
Ueda.5In response to these attacks,anti-racism campaigners andAinu activists have labeledthese media-based and cyberbased attacks as “hate speech,”grouping them with a wave of
xenophobic protests and cyberbullying emerging around the
mid-2000s. 6 On 25 August
2014, a loosely based collective
calling itself Sapporo Against
Racism (SAR) launched an
online petition drive to demand
Sapporo City Assembly pass a
resolution calling for Kaneko’s
r e s i g n a t i o n . 7 Th e p e t i t i o n
described how Kaneko’s tweet

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
negated both Ainu existence ashumans and their sense ofethnic identity and belonging as
Ainu, further accusing the Ainu
of cheating the system byabusing public funds earmarked
to ease inequality, all publicstatements unfitting to ane l e c t e d o f fi c i a l . 8 O n 2 2
September 2014, the Sapporo
City Assembly approved aresolution demanding Kaneko’s
resignation from the municipal
assembly. Due to the nonbinding nature of the resolution
Kaneko refused to resign, but hewas expelled from his party, theLiberal Democratic Party (LDP).
Kaneko’s initial tweets later
fanned outward. On 11
November 2014, Hokkaido
prefectural legislator Onodera
Masaru, the same lawmaker
who had ordered a massive
financial audit of AAH in 2009,
tweeted that the question ofwhether Ainu can actually berecognized as Indigenous
peoples must be revisited, andany funding allocated to Ainu
programs or for Ainu welfare
likewise must be reevaluatedand possibly revoked. During
the ensuing months, Onodera
elevated his criticism, pullingfrom archival materials andscholarly records to bolster hiscase against the AAH. Civil
society likewise registeredoutrage at this denial of Ainu
humanity. A broad multiethnics c h o l a r- a c t i v i s t a l l i a n c e
infuriated by this unbridled
cyber hate speech and its basis
in erroneous historicalrevisionism coalesced quickly,
publishing an anthology
rejecting the validity of what
they termed the Ainu Minzoku
Hitei-ron (“Discourse of Ainu
Peoples’ Non-existence”) in
February 2015.9 This alliance

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
emerged in part from a tacticalstrategy to help educate thepublic about the Ainu
contemporary and historicalsituation, and thus to ensurethat Kaneko and Onodera
would be driven from officeduring the April 2015 generalelections. Ainu and non-Ainu
supporters thus sought to rectify
the damaging impact of thismisguided discourse in theabsence of any response fromofficial Ainu organizations. By
early April 2015, SAR’s petition
had gathered more than 15,000
signatures and signers had beenencouraged to circulate thepetition to social media
networks. Indeed, the morning
papers bore the results on 12
April 2015: neither Kaneko nor
Onodera managed to gain
reelection and their terms
concluded by the end of April
2015, which was declared amajor victory by SAR andpetition supporters.
Yet, most troubling, these
inflammatory remarks against
Ainu and the tweets thatelaborated the sources of thehistorical interpretations that fed
these anti-Ainu perspectives
have already travelled to thebroader netto uyoko (Net Far
Right) circuit. Since themid-2000s, new patterns of
online xenophobic rhetoric
have emerged wherein membersof right-wing groups film staged
street protests and rallies
featuring anti-Korean or antiChinese resident rhetoric andstreamed these in real-time.10 By
streaming these protests on
interactive platforms, these newright-wing groups encouraged
viewers to vicariously
participate through posting
messages to the video streams,
thus boosting circulation of this10

ultranationalist discourse, andcreating the sensation thatthousands of supporters were
engaged in the real-time
protests. Kaneko and Onodera
both extensively utilized twitterand other social media
applications to circulate theiranti-Ainu rhetoric and thus their
historical interpretations andarguments about Ainu “nonexistence,” in part to ensure thatthese would be circulated toand adopted by other membersof the netto uyoku. As of Fall
2014, related right-wing groupsin Tokyo had already begun toappropriate the Ainu “nonexistence” theory and combine
this with ongoing xenophobic
displays against Koreans andChinese neighborhoods, toargue that none of these ethnic
minority communities shouldbe eligible for government
support.11 Civil society groups
such as Counter-Racism Action
Collective and Onnagumi havejoined together with SAR tos t a g e s i g n i fi c a n t c o u n t e rdemonstrations against theKo d o - s u r u U n d o ( A c t i o n
Movement) or Kodo-suru Hoshu(Action Conservatives),
including a travelling panel
exhibit, and petition drives to
educate Japanese voters about
the politics of candidates on theballot. And certainly, themassive petition drive organized
to oust Kaneko in fall 2014
proved to have a major impact
with Kaneko’s failed bid to winreelection in April 2015.
Meanwhile, despite thesedevelopments and theincreasingly shrill displays ofhate speech against minorities
in Japan, performances that
often threaten violence, theJa p a n e s e g ove r n m e n t h a s
remained silent. During Japan’s

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFC
periodic hearings at theCommittee on the Eliminationof Racial Discrimination (CERD)
in late August 2014, adelegation of Ainu, Okinawan,
and ethnic Koreans presented ashadow report to educate thecommittee about the frightening
escalation in hate speech andt h r e a t s o f v i o l e n c e .12 I n
response, the CERD drew upon
new measures developed to
identify cases of hate speech
and provide specific measuresthat state governments should
adopt to combat its
dissemination and any
escalation of violence it
p r e c i p i t a t e s .13 C E R D
specifically condemned theJapanese government’s refusal
to take concrete steps tocensure hate speech in publicforums or the media, andexpressed concern at theabsence of investigations orprosecutions in response to hatespeech. 14 CERD urged theJapanese government tointroduce punitive measuresagainst public officials “whodisseminate hate speech andincitement to hatred” including
removing them from office,because of the potential of such
rhetoric to escalate into
physical and other forms ofdebilitating violence.15 WhileC E R D ’s r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s
constitute important censurefrom international society, they
do not override statesovereignty. That is, they cannot
directly compel the government
to take corrective action nor dothey provide punitive measureswhen it fails to act. Ultimately
these recommendations andJapan’s periodic reports to
CERD and other United Nations
human rights treaty monitoring
bodies constitute a moral
compass, emphasizing the

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
values of international society
in ensuring that human rights
are advanced within eachsovereign nation.
Social Media and Human
Rights: Possibilities and Pitfalls
Increasingly, social media arebeing used to facilitate
Indigenous communities inasserting “digital selfdetermination.” In this sense
social media enables
Indigenous communities toforge and assert real-world
sovereignty in online contexts
by utilizing the user-friendly
interfaces of social media tools
to strengthen claims ofs o v e r e i g n t y. Ye t d i g i t a ltechnologies still harbor thelimitations of the non-digitalworld. They are often used to denyfull enjoyment of human rights for
Indigenous and other communities
and/or to reinforce the genderstereotypes, racism, colonialism
and hetereopatriarchy16 of theoffline world. As anthropologist
Tomomi Yamaguchi (2013)17 has
documented in her study of theultra right-wing’s use of theinternet to circulate neonationalist xenophobic rhetoric,use of digital technologies also
portends troubling conservativeand racist trends because of theanonymity it affords its users
and user ability to broadcast
hate-based rhetoric toaudiences at great distances,even if the offline gatherings arequite small.
But these same disadvantages
m ay b e t ra n s f o r m e d i n t ostrengths for Indigenous
communities. When the rightwing hate speech circulated
over twitter feeds and sought todisable the funding support for
Ainu in Hokkaido, Ainu cyber-

11

networks leveraged theirpositions to circulate updates
about counter-racism actions, tolaunch petition drives, to callfor impromptu protests andgatherings to counter public
displays of hate speech, and todisseminate information. Ifutilized carefully, these serve asa means of empowerment and a
way to discuss diverse
viewpoints in private groupsettings and to overcome great
physical distances toward
cultivating group cohesion. I
urge that we question how
indigenous scholars, both Ainu
and non-Ainu, and theircolleagues outside educationalsettings might take part in an
Ainu affirming movement andchallenge the hegemony of thissmall, but strident, minority ofvoices seeking to leveragecyberspaces to circulate theirnoxious messages. While
positioning social media as animportant communications toolfor indigenous networking anddiscussing a wide range ofissues, it is critical that we do
not forget its social context. It is
not a value-free tool, nor is it
beyond the spaces or theimaginary realm of the nation. It
remains firmly embedded in the
dialogues and discourses of theoffline world.
ann-elise lewallen is AssistantProfessor of East Asian
Languages and Cultural Studies,
University of California, Santa
Barbara.
For further information, pleasecontact: ann-elise lewallen, East
Asian Languages and Cultural
Studies, HSSB 4001, Universityof California, Santa Barbara,
Santa Barbara, CA 93106-9670
USA; ph: (805) 893-4505; fax:

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC(805) 893-7671; e-mail:lewallen@eastasian.ucsb.edu;
www.eastasian.ucsb.edu/home/faculty/ann-elise-lewallen/.

Endnotes
1 The Council for Ainu Policy
Promotionatwww.kantei.go.jp/jp/singi/
ainusuishin/index_e.html.
2 H t t p s : / / t w i t t e r. c o m /kaneko_yasuyuki/status/
498816070531031041,
accessed 23 April 2015
3 I would like to thank Chisato
Abe and Mark Winchester for
sharing public statements andother information in responseto the hate speech campaigns
against Ainu in 2014-15,
including the 25 August 2014
petition drive.
4 A full selection of Kaneko’s
anti-Ainu statements andresponses to critics can befound here: http://m a t o m e . n a v e r. j p / o d a i /2140833107202415301,
accessed 23 April 2015.
5 “Kaneko Sapporo-shigi no‘Ainu Minzoku inai’ Hatsugen,
Suga Kanbochokan mohihan.” Asahi Shimbun, 26
August 2014, page 34, and“Jiminkaihaga
R i d a t s u k a n k o k u ,shitagawanekereba jomei‘Ainu Minzoku inai’ Hatsugen
no Sapporo shigi.” Asahi
Shimbun, 29 August 2014,
page 30.
6 Lawyers Association of
Zainichi Koreans (LAZAK),“Discrimination Against
Koreans in Japan: Japan’s
Violation of the International
Convention on the Eliminationo f A l l Fo r m s o f R a c i a l
Discr imination.” Shadow
Report to the 7th-9th Periodic
Reports of Japan, 85th Sessionof the Committee on the

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
Elimination of Racial
D i s c r i m i n a t i o n . G e n e va :11-29 August 2014.
7 For more information on thispetition, see Mark Winchesterand Akira Okawada, editors,
Ainu minzoku hiteiron ni
kosuru (Tokyo: Kawade Shobo
Shinsha, 2015).
8 Petition available atwww.change.org/p/ Sapporo
S h i g i k a i g i ch o - Ta k a h a s h i Katsutomo-sama-Ainu
Minzoku he no Heito Supichi
wo Tekkai shinai Sapporo
Shigikaigiin-Kaneko Yasuyuki
ni tai suru Giin Jishoku
Kankoku Ketsugi wo
Motomemasu, accessed 2 May
2015.
9 See Winchester and Okawada
op. cit.
10 Y a m a g u c h i , T o m o m i ,“Xenophobia in Action:
Ultranationalism, Hate
Speech, and the Internet in
Japan” in Radical History
Review, 2013, 117(Fall):98-118.
11 My gratitude for the CounterRacism Action Committee fororganizing the Sapporo
Against Racism Panel Exhibit,
22-24 November 2014, andhelping to elucidate thedisturbing links between Ainu
and other minoritizedcommunities in Japan as
subjects of Far Right racism.
12 LAZAK, op. cit., pages 27–35.
13 Committee on the Eliminationof Racial Discrimination,“General Recommendation
No. 35: Combatting Racist
Hate Speech.” International
Convention on the Eliminationo f A l l Fo r m s o f R a c i a l
Discrimination, CERD/C/GC/
35, 26 September 2013. Fulltext of recommendation
available at http://
tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/
treatybodyexternal/
D o w n l o a d . a s p x ?

12symbolno=CERD/C/GC/
35&Lang=en.
14 Committee on the Elimination of
Racial Discrimination,“Concluding Observations on the
Combined Seventh to Ninth
Periodic Reports of Japan,” CERD/
C/JPN/CO/7-9, 29 August 2014.
Full text of the Concluding
observations available at http://
tbinternet.ohchr.org/Treaties/CERD/
Shared%20Documents/JPN/
CERD_C_JPN_CO_7-9_18106_E.
pdf.
15 Ibid.
16 Heteropatriarchy refers to thedominance of heterosexual
men in societies around theglobe, especially as pertains tolegal and political power, andthe corresponding delegitimization of non-male andnon-heterosexual persons.
17 Yamaguchi, op. cit.

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFCSEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81

More Care, Less Tragedy: Left-behind Children in
China
Xu ZhenIn mid-2015, two tragedies
about “left-behind” children
attracted attention across China.
Four young siblings were founddead on the 9th of June after
drinking pesticide in Cizhu
Village, Bijie city, Guizhou
Province. The four children,
aged from five to thirteen, lived
alone and stopped going toschool a month before
committing suicide. According
to village residents, their father
worked in another place andtheir mother disappeared three
years ago. The suicide shocked
the whole nation. However, thistragedy happened again after
two months. A fifteen-year-old
girl and her twelve-year-old
brother were killed at home in
Nayong county in Bijie city on
the 3rd of August. Six days later,
the police arrested two suspects
who admitted to having raped
the girl. Residents in the village
said that this teenage victim waspreviously raped in 2014 by asixty-year-old man. But she
decided not to report the crimeto the police after receiving acompensation of 30,000 Yuan(about 4,750 US dollars).1
The six children in these twocases drew national attention to
the plight of “Bijie-like”
children in China, the so-called“left-behind children.” They arerural children who usually livewith relatives, generally theirg ra n d p a r e n t s , wh i l e t h e i rparents are working far awayfrom home. These left-behindchildren unnecessarily suffer
miserable life due to separated
family, poor living conditions,involvement in crime, deep fearand loneliness.
BackgroundPhenomenon

of

the

With the economic reform andthe continuing advance ofurbanization in the 1980s, asignificant number of surplus
rural labor consisting of young
adults left their homes andbecame workers in cities,
forming a spectacular “flood ofworkers.” However, due to thehousehold registration system(called hukou) and their low
income, the vast majority ofthem were not able to settle
down in big cities, as well as
bring their children with them.
Under this situation, more andmore children were being left
behind in the rural areas as thenumber of migrant workers
increased. Although thisphenomenon appeared in the
1980s, these children had little
national attention until media
reports on their plight started
appearing in 2004.
Statistics on Left-behindChildren in China
In 2014, the All China Women’sFederation (ACWF) issued areport about left-behind13children in the rural areas.2 This
report, based on the data of thesixth population census in
2010, calculated that there
were about sixty-one million
left-behind children in rural
areas, covering 37.7 percent of
the total rural children
population and 21.88 percent
of all the children in China.
Among the left-behind children
in rural areas, 32.01 percent(about nineteen million) were
six to eleven year-olds, while
1 6 . 3 p e rc e n t ( a l m o s t t e nmillion) were twelve to fourteen
year-olds. 79.7 percent of thesechildren were raised by their
grandparents, 13 percent were
entrusted to their relatives and7.3 percent were not taken
cared of by adults and suffered
the worst conditions. Most ofthese children did not see theirparents frequently: 11.1 percent
met their parents three or fourtimes a month; 32.7 percent
met their parents more than fivetimes a year; 11.7 percent met
their parents three to four times
a year; 29.4 percent could only
meet their parents once or twicea year; and the rest, about 15.1
percent either failed to see theirparents for more than a year ornever saw their parents at all.
The phenomenon of left-behindchildren appears not only in theeconomically poor areas in the
mid-west region of China, butalso in eastern provinces thatare economically advanced

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
such as Jiangsu, Guangdong
and Shandong.
Problems Faced by Left-behindChildren
The Chinese government’s white
paper on the left-behindchildren, issued in June 2015,
identified the following threemain problems they face:3
1) H i g h r a t e o f c r i m einvolvement
One of the most striking aspectsof the report is the alarmingly
high proportion, 65.3 percent,of the juvenile crimes involving
children of the migrant workers.
But these children are also themost vulnerable to human rights
violations including sexual
abuse, lack of protection fromparents, and not having
education. According to somecriminology experts andmembers of the police force,the crimes involving left-behindchildren tend to have “threelows”: low age, low legal
awareness, and low education.
They also notice a common
factor in these cases: aproblematic family is behindeach so-called “problematicyoungster.” Lack of education of

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
family members and lack ofprotection from the family
should be responsible for thissituation. Children who are left
in the rural areas either staying
home alone or commuting
between home and school bythemselves are lured bycriminals to commit crimes to
get money or to release theiranxiety and relieve their pain.
Also, compared to otherchildren, they are more exposedto the criminals because they
are not protected by adults, andthey lack knowledge on legal
measures to protect themselves.
In this situation, the criminals
usually escape legal
punishment.
2) Bad mental condition
Since many left-behind children
are not with their parents intheir daily life, they more or lesssuffer mental problems
compared to other children.
They tend to be more anxious,
worried, lonely, confused andpressured. Chart 1 below showsno obvious difference in theacademic performance between
left-behind children and otherchildren.4 See Chart 1 below.
However, on satisfaction about
one’s self, the left-behind

Chart 1children are prone to saying
they are less satisfied with theirselves. See Chart 2 below.5
Besides, they tend to haveextreme behavior; they can beworking very hard to reach the
top of the class or abandon
themselves totally. But whatever
behavior they show, all of them
have unstable mental condition,
which is a cause of problems.
3) Education
According to some researches,most of the left-behind children
can get compulsory educationi n s c h o o l . H o w e v e r, t h esituation in the midwest regionis quite worrying; children offamilies that cannot afford theireducation end up doing farm
work.
Additionally, most guardians of
the left-behind children are lesswilling to take part in thechildren’s education and regard
it as the school’s responsibility.
But the guardians are needed in
the education of the left-behindchildren. This situation and therelatively low pay make theworking condition of teachers
in the rural areas quite hard,and make many people
reluctant to become teachers in
Chart 214

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
rural areas. The inadequate
educational support leads to a
vicious cycle of poverty andlack of education.
Xu Zhen is an undergraduate
student from Fudan University.
She was an intern in
HURIGHTS OSAKA during theApril to July 2015 period.
For further information pleasecontact HURIGHTS OSAKA.

Right to Land and the Ainu
(Continued from page 4)

6
7

8

and
Colonized
Hokkaido],” International
Study Journal, vol. 7 1994,
page 133.
Now known as Ogasawara
Islands.
This amendment of the land
law was made in view of therevision of 1854 AngloJapanese Friendship Treaty.
See full text of the
Declaration at www.un.org/

Beyond the Present Ainu Policy(Continued from page 8)

nous Voices – Fact Sheet,www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfi
i/documents/5session_factshe
et1.pdf.
15 Porter, op. cit., page 203.
16 Ibid., page 209.
17 General Comment No. 23 of
the Human Rights Committee,
CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.5, 26
April 1994, available at
http://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_lay

SEPTEMBER 2015 VOLUME 81
Endnotes
1 毕节留守姐弟被害案细节：姐姐曾遭60岁老人侵害 [Details
about the case of left-behindchildren in Bijie: The girl once
suffered sexual abuse], http://
news.163.com/15/0807/12/
B0DSMJU400011229.html
2 中国留守儿童心灵状况白皮书image.cdb.org.cn/editor/
20150629/files/《中国留守儿童心灵状况白皮书（2015）》.pdf
3 Ibid., pages 1-2
4 Ibid., page 13
5 Ibid., page 14.

(2015) [White Paper on Leftb e h i n d C h i l d r e n ’s M e n t a l
Condition (2015)], All China
Women’s Federation, http://

esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/
DRIPS_en.pdf
9 Ainu Association of
Hokkaido, Supplementary
Report on the Ninth Sessionof the Working Group on
Rights of the Indigenous
Peoples, 2003.
10 Kayano, et al., v. Hokkaido
Syuyouiinkai [Hokkaido Land
Expropriation Committee],1598 HANREI JIHO 33, 46(Sapporo District Court, 27
March 1997).
11 See 2009 Final Report of theAdvisory Council for Future
Ainu Policy, page 30 atwww.kantei.go.jp/jp/singi/
ainu/dai10/siryou1_en.pdf.

12 See Council for Ainu Policy
P r o m o t i o n ,www.kantei.go.jp/jp/singi/
a i n u s u i s h i n /index_e.html#about.
13 See Overview of the Master
Plan for the “Symbolic Space
for Ethnic Harmony” in
www.kantei.go.jp/jp/singi/
a i n u s u i s h i n / p d f /symbolicspace_e.pdf. Seea l s o J i j i , “A i n u c e n t e r
operations policy getsCabinetOK,”www.japantimes.co.jp/news/
2014/06/16/national/socialissues/ainu-center-operationspolicy-gets-cabinet-ok/#.VcGs4fmqqko.

outs/treatybodyexternal/TBSea
rch.aspx?Lang=en&TreatyID=
8&DocTypeID=11; General
Comment No. 21 of theCommittee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights,
E/C.12/GC/21, 21 December
2009, available at
http://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/treatybodyexternal/TBSea
rch.aspx?TreatyID=9&DocTypeID=11.
18 Porter, op. cit., page 210.
19 Ochiai, K., Minzokukyosei noshocho to naru kukan koso no
kenpogakuteki igi [Constitutional significance of a con-

cept of Symbolic Space forEthnic Harmony]. Kokusai
Jinken Hiroba No. 108, 2013,www.hurights.or.jp/archives/n
ewsletter/sectiion3/2013/03/p
ost-204.html (accessed on 8
August 2015), pages 3-5.
20 Article 98 provides that “[T]hetreaties concluded by Japanand established laws of nations shall be faithfully observed.”

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