As part of a significant revision of the country’s sex crime laws, a panel appointed by the Japanese justice ministry on Friday suggested raising the country’s age of consent, which is now among the lowest in the world at just 13.
The proposal to raise the consent age to 16 is one of a number of reforms that would also define the conditions for rape prosecution and make voyeurism a crime.
Following many controversial rape acquittals, the justice minister received proposals that will serve as the foundation for draught reforms that could be approved by parliament later this year.
Since it was enacted in 1907, Japan’s age of consent, which is the lowest among the G7 industrialised nations, has not altered.
In France, Germany, and China, the legal consent age is 14, while it is 16 in the United Kingdom and South Korea.
Children who are at least 13 years old are considered to be capable of consenting under current Japanese law, therefore engaging in sexual intercourse with them is not regarded as statutory rape.
Because of this, even teenage rape victims must overcome the same formidable obstacles to prosecuting their assailants as adults.
In many areas of Japan, regional laws prohibiting ‘lewd’ acts with children are frequently interpreted as effectively raising the legal age of consent to 18.
But, they carry much less severe punishments than rape accusations and classify having sex with children as merely ‘unethical’ behaviour, ‘totally ignoring its forced nature,’ says Kazuna Kanajiri, a campaigner against pornography and sexual exploitation.
Kanajiri stated that, the leader of Tokyo-based organisation PAPS, this gives offenders space to ‘transfer blame to the victims, and allege that sex was initiated or enjoyed by the minors.’ Kanajiri supports proposals to raise the age of consent to 16.
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