TOKYO, Dec. 17 (Xinhua) -- Two more Japanese people filed lawsuits on Monday seeking compensation from the Japanese government, claiming they were forcibly sterilized under the nation's former eugenics protection law.
The two men, in their 70s and 80s respectively, filed the lawsuits with the Sendai District Court, seeking a total of 66 million yen (582,000 U.S. dollars) in damages.
The two men said that they were forced to have the sterilization surgery after being involved with facilities for people with intellectual disabilities.
The man in his 70s said that a nurse told him then that the surgery was "for a hernia", while the other plaintiff said that he underwent the surgery when he was only 15 years old and didn't realize the meaning of the surgery until he became an adult.
The total number of plaintiffs in sterilization lawsuits against the government has increased to 15, with the plaintiffs claiming that being forcibly sterilized under the eugenics law, which was enacted in postwar Japan in 1948 and kept in place until 1996, deprived them of their constitutional right to choose whether or not to have children.
According to the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare and the Japan Federation of Bar Associations, up until the eugenics law was removed in 1996, of 25,000 people who were sterilized for reasons of mental disabilities and other illnesses, 16,500 people were sterilized without giving their prior consent.
In January, a woman in her 60s filed Japan's first lawsuit against the government, claiming that she was forcibly sterilized.
More people across the nation are expected to come forward and sue the government as a legal body was formed in May to deal with nationwide cases.
