Our petitition is still open and we owe you an update. The reason why we haven’t closed the petition is that we have it from a reliable source that Universal is till trying to get the movie screened in Japan. Now that the movie will be released on dvd and other platforms, we hope that the Japanese are able to still get the movie, if they want to see it. Because of the movie being released elsewhere, and possibly, renewed interest for the movie, we want people to continue to sign and bring this issue under the attention of the general and wider public. We also want to thank courageous Japanese people like Tanaka Akishige who started his own petition in Japan in favor of UNBROKEN. Sadly, it has also come to our attention that US Speaker of the House John Boehner is rubbing salt in the wounds of the victims of WWII and their descendants by having invited Japanese Prime Minister Abe to address US Congress… on Hirohito’s birthday in April. We, together with several other POW and civilian organizations have reached out to leaders in Washington to protest this. As we have pointed out in this petition already, unlike Germany, Japan has come far from clean in the process of truth, justice and reconciliation with the nations it invaded during WWII. Mr. Boehner’s invitation of Mr. Abe on Hirohito’s birthday is baffling, showing: - a profound disregard for world history and the war crimes that were committed by Mr. Abe’s own family and Emperor Hirohito, and - a great disrespect of the people Mr. Boehner is supposed to be serving and representing, i.e. the many US POWs of the war in Asia and the Pacific, as well as former Dutch East Indies citizens and their families who have become US citizens and have made this country their home. However, in the light of truth and reconciliation, we welcome Mr. Abe’s address to US Congress, although to HONOR and comprehensively APOLOGIZE and not to insult the many victims and their families. In addition, we insist Mr. Boehner change the date. We seriously hope that Mr. Abe can take the words of the current Japanese Emperor and the Crown Prince to heart, namely that the current Japanese government and conservative Japanese revisionists ought to “look back humbly on the past and correctly pass on the tragic experiences and history of WWII.” Or to quote Jan Thompson of the American Defenders of Bataan & Corregidor Memorial Society: “We want Congress to only extend the invitation to Prime Minister Abe to speak at the podium of Roosevelt and Churchill if they are assured that he will acknowledge that Japan’s defeat released the country from the venom of fascism and the inhuman goals of a criminal regime.” Share this petition to make our voices heard. Boehner’s controversial invitation and harmful and hurtful oversight probably only happened because the victims and their stories have been silenced and denied for far too long. We urge Mr. Boehner to review and check the facts of WWII history in Asia. A movie like UNBROKEN might be a good start...