Tsutomu Nishioka (西岡 力, Nishioka Tsutomu, born 1956 in Tokyo) is a professor of International Christian Studies at Tokyo Christian University. He specializes in Japan-Korean relations, South Korea/North Korea Studies. His research focuses on the Comfort women and the North Korean abductions of Japanese citizens. He is a chairman of the National Association for the Rescue of Japanese Kidnapped by North Korea (NARKN).[1]
He graduated from Tokyo Christian University in 1979 and earned a master's degree in International Area Studies from the graduate school of University of Tsukuba in 1983. He studied at the International Division in Yonsei University from 1977 to 1978. He worked at the Embassy of Japan in South Korea as a special researcher for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 1982 to 1984. He was an Editor in Chief of the Gendai Korea (Today's Korea) journal from 1990 to 2002.[1][2]
In 2016, he started working as a guest professor for Reitaku University.
He was accused of defamation on January 9, 2015, by a former Asahi Shimbun reporter Takashi Uemura who wrote a series of articles on the comfort women issue, the first of which in 1991.[3] Nishioka accused Uemura of "fabricating" his stories on comfort women. Takashi Uemura demanded that Bungeishunju Ltd. and Tsutomu Nishioka pay ¥27.5 million in damages and issue apologies. The Tokyo District Court in 2019 rejected his claims for damages, the ruling determined that Nishioka's claims about two articles written by Uemura “did not deviate from the scope of regular reviews.”.[4]
Uemura appealed to the Supreme Court in Tokyo, which issued its ruling on the case on March 11, 2021, rejecting Uemura's appeal. The court concluded that: “An important part of the articles and claims [of fabrication] moved by Mr. Nishioka were based on the truth.”[5]
