Brazil Apologizes for Persecuting Japanese Immigrants After World War II

The Brazilian government has apologized for human rights violations and the persecution of Japanese immigrants after World War II.

"I want to apologize on behalf of the Brazilian state for the persecution that your ancestors suffered, for the barbarities, cruelties, torture, prejudice, ignorance, xenophobia and racism," said Eneá de Stutz e Almeida, president of the Amnesty Commission, an advisory board of the Brazilian Ministry of Human Rights and Citizenship that analyzes requests for amnesty and reparations for victims of political persecution in the country, on Thursday.

The commission approved the apology at a meeting in Brasília, which was attended by members of the Brazilian government and the Japanese community.

A report by the Amnesty Commission acknowledged that 172 immigrants were sent to a concentration camp on the coast of São Paulo, where they were mistreated and tortured between 1946 and 1948.

There is "ample documentation proving the political persecution" suffered by the community of Japanese immigrants and descendants "perpetrated by the State", said the commission's rapporteur, Vanda Davi Fernandes de Oliveira, quoted by the Brazilian news portal G1.

The request for reparations was filed in 2015 by the Okinawa Kenjin Association of Brazil, claiming that, after the start of World War II, members of the Japanese community were mistreated and discriminated against.

Brazil joined the Allies in 1942 and severed diplomatic relations with Japan. After that, the Brazilian government confiscated Japanese-owned property and immigrants were not allowed to meet or speak Japanese publicly.

Filmmaker Mario Jun Okuhara, who documented the persecution and supported the complaint, said the ancestors were detained, tortured and accused of being spies and saboteurs. Brazil is home to the largest Japanese community in the world outside Japan, with more than 2.7 million Japanese and descendants. The first ships from the Asian country arrived in Brazil in 1908, and immigration peaked between the two world wars.