Christopher Reed: Japan's Foreign Minister Taro Aso refuses to acknowledge his family firm's use of PoWs as forced labour
[Christopher Reed is a British freelance journalist based in Japan.]
THE next time Japan's Foreign Minister Taro Aso visits Australia, there are a handful of blokes who would like to talk to him about the time they worked for his dad at the Aso family coalmine. But it would not be a cosy meeting.
The former Aso workers are Australian prisoners of war who in 1945 were forced to endure slave conditions at one of the pits owned by Aso's family business, which dates back to the 19th century. Aso Mining Co (now the Aso Group) was one of many Japanese corporations that illicitly coerced Allied PoWs into heavy labour during the Pacific war.
"I'd like to meet Mr Aso," says Joe Coombs, 85, of Regents Park, Sydney. Coombs is a former infantry corporal and one of nine known prisoners still alive who worked at Aso. "I'd like to tell him what happened to us there and how we were treated by his people: the beatings, the starvation diet, the back-breaking work. Then I'd invite him to apologise."
Coombs is one of four PoWs exploited by Aso's family who spoke to The Australian. The others were either too ill to speak or didn't wish to dredge up the past.
Aso, who yesterday conducted a private visit to the Juganji temple where foreign PoWs' remains were kept, has never acknowledged his family firm's role in forced labour during the war. His father, Takakichi, ran Aso Mining during the Pacific war and Taro was its head from 1973 to 1979, before entering politics with the Liberal Democratic Party.
The Nazis enslaved millions of people, mainly East Europeans, but Germany has paid billions in compensation. No Japanese government has apologised to victims or given them a cent.
Legally, post-war treaties freed Japan from any obligation to make payments; however, these were signed before the extent of war crimes was known.
In 2001, the Australian Government paid former Japanese PoWs $25,000 each and eventually 7300 were compensated. But there is still the question of hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid wages.
Lack of atonement and reparations for war crimes in Asia has become the chief obstacle to normal relations between Japan and its neighbours, including China and the two Koreas. Of late, this has involved Aso personally, with disclosures of his family links not only to thousands of Korean slave labourers but to Allied PoWs as well.
In the final year of the war, 197 Australian prisoners were held at Camp No.26 in Fukuoka prefecture in the southern island of Kyushu, which supplied labour to Aso's Yoshikuma mine. Two men died: Signalman John Watson, 32, of the 8th Signals division, from NSW, and Private Leslie Edgar George Wilkie, 28, of the ALF 2/10 Ordnance Corps, from Queensland. There were also 101 British and two Dutch prisoners. They were imprisoned in appalling conditions, starved and beaten. They worked deep underground in dangerous seams where tunnel ceilings often collapsed. They were surrounded by electrified fences 3m high and slept in vermin-infested quarters, and their pitiful "wages" were never paid. Many died of ailments associated with malnutrition and overwork....
Even before he was appointed Foreign Minister last October, Aso demonstrated an apologist attitude towards Japan's colonial history and imperial wars. He angered millions of Koreans by suggesting that during Japanese colonial rule they voluntarily adopted Japanese names; in fact, Tokyo passed a law compelling them to do so.
Last year, in a speech at the opening of a museum in Kyushu, Aso echoed pre-war Japanese racism by describing Japan as unique in terms of culture, language, history and race.
He is also known to be associated with the extreme right-wing Nippon Kaigi (Japan Conference), which has reacted with hostility to attempts by scholars, historians and journalists to uncover details about Japan's extensive use of Chinese, Korean and Allied forced labour during the war years....
Read entire article at Australian
THE next time Japan's Foreign Minister Taro Aso visits Australia, there are a handful of blokes who would like to talk to him about the time they worked for his dad at the Aso family coalmine. But it would not be a cosy meeting.
The former Aso workers are Australian prisoners of war who in 1945 were forced to endure slave conditions at one of the pits owned by Aso's family business, which dates back to the 19th century. Aso Mining Co (now the Aso Group) was one of many Japanese corporations that illicitly coerced Allied PoWs into heavy labour during the Pacific war.
"I'd like to meet Mr Aso," says Joe Coombs, 85, of Regents Park, Sydney. Coombs is a former infantry corporal and one of nine known prisoners still alive who worked at Aso. "I'd like to tell him what happened to us there and how we were treated by his people: the beatings, the starvation diet, the back-breaking work. Then I'd invite him to apologise."
Coombs is one of four PoWs exploited by Aso's family who spoke to The Australian. The others were either too ill to speak or didn't wish to dredge up the past.
Aso, who yesterday conducted a private visit to the Juganji temple where foreign PoWs' remains were kept, has never acknowledged his family firm's role in forced labour during the war. His father, Takakichi, ran Aso Mining during the Pacific war and Taro was its head from 1973 to 1979, before entering politics with the Liberal Democratic Party.
The Nazis enslaved millions of people, mainly East Europeans, but Germany has paid billions in compensation. No Japanese government has apologised to victims or given them a cent.
Legally, post-war treaties freed Japan from any obligation to make payments; however, these were signed before the extent of war crimes was known.
In 2001, the Australian Government paid former Japanese PoWs $25,000 each and eventually 7300 were compensated. But there is still the question of hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid wages.
Lack of atonement and reparations for war crimes in Asia has become the chief obstacle to normal relations between Japan and its neighbours, including China and the two Koreas. Of late, this has involved Aso personally, with disclosures of his family links not only to thousands of Korean slave labourers but to Allied PoWs as well.
In the final year of the war, 197 Australian prisoners were held at Camp No.26 in Fukuoka prefecture in the southern island of Kyushu, which supplied labour to Aso's Yoshikuma mine. Two men died: Signalman John Watson, 32, of the 8th Signals division, from NSW, and Private Leslie Edgar George Wilkie, 28, of the ALF 2/10 Ordnance Corps, from Queensland. There were also 101 British and two Dutch prisoners. They were imprisoned in appalling conditions, starved and beaten. They worked deep underground in dangerous seams where tunnel ceilings often collapsed. They were surrounded by electrified fences 3m high and slept in vermin-infested quarters, and their pitiful "wages" were never paid. Many died of ailments associated with malnutrition and overwork....
Even before he was appointed Foreign Minister last October, Aso demonstrated an apologist attitude towards Japan's colonial history and imperial wars. He angered millions of Koreans by suggesting that during Japanese colonial rule they voluntarily adopted Japanese names; in fact, Tokyo passed a law compelling them to do so.
Last year, in a speech at the opening of a museum in Kyushu, Aso echoed pre-war Japanese racism by describing Japan as unique in terms of culture, language, history and race.
He is also known to be associated with the extreme right-wing Nippon Kaigi (Japan Conference), which has reacted with hostility to attempts by scholars, historians and journalists to uncover details about Japan's extensive use of Chinese, Korean and Allied forced labour during the war years....