TOKYO, June 28 (Xinhua) -- Three more Japanese people filed lawsuits on Thursday seeking compensation from the government claiming they were forcibly sterilized or forced to have an abortion under the nation's former eugenics protection law.
In Hokkaido Prefecture, a married couple filed a lawsuit, while a man in Kumamoto Prefecture did the same at his district court, with the total amount of damages being sought being 44 million yen (400,000 U.S. dollars).
According to sources close to the matter, the plaintiffs claim that being sterilized against their will or without their consent runs contrary to their constitutional rights and the Japanese government had since provided no requital or support.
"The surgery robbed us of our long-awaited opportunity to have a child as well as the right to decide whether or not to have one," the couple in Hokkaido were quoted as saying.
The complaint is based around the woman in Hokkaido, who reportedly had a minor intellectual disability, conceiving a child in 1981 and being forced by her family to have an abortion.
Her family told her that due to her "mental deficiency" she would never be able to "give birth or raise children."
She was also told that if she were to go ahead with the pregnancy it would be a burden on the family because she wouldn't be able to raise the child herself.
The woman, now aged 75, still feels a great deal of regret at not being allowed to become a mother due to the pressure from her relatives, and her husband said he felt awful for allowing his wife to undergo an abortion and sterilization.
"Together with my husband, I would have liked to raise our child," the woman was quoted as saying, while her husband, the first person related to a family member who underwent surgery to bring the case to court, reiterated how sorry he felt for his wife.
In Kumamoto Prefecture, Kazumi Watanabe, 73, was forced to undergo an orchidectomy as he had osteoarthritis as a child.
It wasn't until he was a junior high school student and other children pointed out there was something different about him, that he asked and found out from his parents what had happened.
"Forced surgeries must not happen again. By fighting against the state, I would like this to be my living testimony," Watanabe was quoted as saying of the contentious matter.
The total number of plaintiffs in sterilization lawsuits against the government since January has now increased to seven.