Japanese authorities have drawn up a draft investigative report shedding light on how thousands of people were forcibly sterilized under the now-defunct Eugenic Protection Law.

National statistics show that roughly 25,000 people underwent sterilization under the eugenics law, including those who did give their consent for the surgery. The law had authorized surgery without consent on people with mental or genetic disabilities to prevent the birth of what the law called "inferior descendants". It was scrapped in 1996.

Officials at Japan's Diet handed the draft report to the chair of the Upper House Committee on Health, Welfare and Labor, as well as to the head of its Lower House counterpart on Monday.

Japan's Diet passed a law in 2019 aiming at providing relief to those who were forcibly sterilized under the former law. The recent law also stipulated that an investigation be carried out on how the now-defunct law was enacted, with the aim of preventing a similar tragedy in the future.

Investigators looked into 6,550 cases of surgeries, using documents available at local governments' offices nationwide. They found that many of them were sterilized at the request of family members or as a condition before entering welfare facilities.
Another investigation centered on medical and welfare institutions found some people were deceived into believing that they would undergo a different surgery.

The now-defunct law was enacted in 1948 after being approved unanimously by both chambers of the Diet.
The minutes of the Diet meetings at that time show that no deliberations from a critical viewpoint took place against forced sterilization and other related issues.