The andro-centric history='his-story' has been formed by making violence against women invisible and covering over the affliction and powerlessness of women who are forced to keep silence for fear of attack against them. At last, the Women's International War Crimes Tribunal 2000 for the Trial of Japanese Military Sexual Slavery, which took place in Tokyo from December 8-12, made a severe judgment on sexual crimes in wartime, crimes which had originated in the andro-centric state, the Great Japanese Empire, and labelled these crimes against humanity.
Along with the testimonies of former comfort women, analyses of the historical background of the system make clear that the comfort women system was a crime based upon the gender policy of the modern nation-state. For long have Modern nation-states exploited the gender-hierarchical system for the purpose of their establishment and continuation.
Hegel's "The Philosophy of Law" elucidates that nations have been engendered, which reflects national laws and ethics. According to his philosophy, men must work hard to pay taxes, fight for national defense, and carry out national policies. On the other hand, women must be engaged in reproduction, child-rearing, and unpaid house work. If either men or women tried to escape from their duties, they were blamed and punished by the community.
Feminist movements have been fighting against the gender-policy of modern nation-states. The Women's Tribunal was planned by the international women's network and stands as a major achievement of modern feminist movements. It is said that the tribunal was established to redress the historical tendency to trivialize, excuse, marginalize and obfuscate crimes against women, particularly sexual crimes. I want to consider in this paper the new perspectives that will be opened by the spirit of this tribunal.

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In the last decade of the 20th century, two significant events were held to deal with the pasts which were profoundly traumatized by the crimes against humanity; The Truth and Reconciliation Commission in the Republic of South Africa and the Women's International War Crimes Tribunal on Japan's Military Sexual Slavery.
The former avoided the "Nuremberg Option", that is the trial of criminals, in giving priority to establish the national unity and reconciliation. Amnesty was granted to the persons who had made full confession of the truth about their criminal acts with political objectives in the period of Apartheid. This principle of "justice without punishment" was guided not only by some inevitable "material" conditions in the new-born Country, but also by the philosophy of "forgiveness" in its hegelien or arendtien version.
By contrast, the latter declared itself to be a renewal of "Tokyo Tribunal" in order to end the culture of impunity. Three days of trial produced the judgement according to which the Japanese Imperial Army' s "comfort women" stations and wartime sexual violence constituted crimes against humanity and the Supreme Commander of the Army and Navy, Emperor Hirohito did have legal responsibilities. Thus the Women's Tribunal, without real judicial effect, contested both the post-war Japanese culture of impunity about war crimes and the international culture of impunity about crimes against women in war.
These two events can be highly appreciated as those which offered public spaces where the voices of victims and perpetrators could be heard seriously for the first time.

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Breaking five decades of silence, Asian women courageously emerged in the public arena as survivors of Japanese military sexual slavery. The immediate response of the Japanese ruling elite was a blatant disregard of their voices and yet another imposition of silence. Under the circumstances, one fundamental challenge facing international legal scholarship is to make an inquiry into the legal implication of silence consistently forced on victimized survivors. It necessarily ignites a process of re-examining the value premises which dictate the purposes and beneficiaries of the international law.
Behind the forced silence is classical liberalism, the dominant theory of international legal studies. Justifying legal regulation based on the ideas of consent, liberty and equality of states, classical liberalism continuously reproduces the preeminent concept of elitism in international society. The fulcrum of this theory may be broken down into four "isms": euro-centrism, andro-centrism, statism and presentism. Under the pretense of objectivism and stability of legal order, classical liberalism strenuously backs up the ruling elites' inhumane response of suppressing survivors' desperate calls.
Vibrant streams increasingly visible in international legal scene in the 1990', represented inter alia by the Australian-led feminist school, effectively debunks the value premises of mainstream international legal studies, thus leading a world-wide movement to "open up" otherwise closed international law. Deliberately un-silencing voices of the "Others", i.e. non-Europeans, women, citizens and the past (and the future) generations, the new movement has brought forth a welcoming progress in international law in such areas as human rights and humanitarian law. Commonly observed in a number of litigations filed by survivors of Japanese military sexual slavery against the culpable government is a call for the deconstruction of international law so that the voices of the Others are secured therein. Clearly, their call synchronizes the world-wide legal movement to reshape international law.
This essay is intended to portray the value premises and legal implications behind international law arguments presented in connection with the issue of Japanese military sexual slavery. Reference is made as well to a Peoples' Tribunal, the Women's International War Crimes Tribunal 2000 in Tokyo, which in the view of the author, is a manifestation of the dynamic process to open up international law to citizens and women, whose agonies have been unheeded in the state-centered, patriarchal international legal scene.

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