Opinion

During the Second World War, the Japanese imperialists organized Unit 731, brought there many prisoners of war and innocent people from Korea, China and elsewhere and carried out living-body tests to make them victims of germ warfare.

But the history of the crime was mostly covered up by the Japanese government.

Recently, a basic document of Harbin Army Hospital No. 1, an accomplice of Unit 731, was opened to public.

The "Basic document of Harbin Army Hospital No. 1 of the Japanese Army" was made public at a scientific seminar on the germ and poisonous gas warfare of the Japanese imperial army for aggression against China, which was held in Mudanjiang of Heilongjiang Province, China, on August 5.

The document is reportedly of great significance in comprehensively scrutinizing the general situation and business process of the Japanese military hospital and intensifying the study of the crimes committed by the hospital.

According to a fellow at the exhibition hall of evidence of crimes committed by Unit 731 of the Japanese imperial army for aggression against China, the hospital was Japan’s largest army hospital in Northeast China which treated and transferred the wounded and other patients, equipped with advanced medical facilities and operating rooms at the time.

The document contains data on the personnel, address and composition of the hospital in the period between July 16 1941 when it was established and October 11 1945.

Data on a poison gas bomb factory was also opened to public definitively proving the use of gas bombs by the Japanese imperialists.

The buildings of the factory where they made the bombs in strict secrecy during the Pacific war exist in Kitakyushu of Fukuoka Prefecture, Japan.

The factory was built in 1937 when the Sino-Japanese war started.

Seven buildings and a cylindrical exhaust shaft still remain intact as they were in those days on a site covering an area of about 50 000 phyong (one phyong is approximately 4 square yards).

In the factory, workers filled shells with such poisonous gases as mustard gas and phosgene.

About 1.5 million gas bombs are said to have been produced there in eight years until the end of the war.

The gas bombs thus produced were used in the Sino-Japanese war.

The factory was closed down with the end of the war and its buildings would be used as a training ground of the Ground Self-Defence Force of Japan after war.

An outstanding characteristic of the buildings as a gas bomb plant is that the windows are 3 metres in height for ventilation.

In front of each building there is an earthen sconce, which is said to have been built to prevent accidental bomb blast from affecting adjacent buildings.

More than 1 000 people worked at the factory.

Though they wore protective rubber clothing and gas masks, many of them suffered injuries.

An NHK programme which was broadcast in 1991 contains testimonies of those who worked at the factory at that time.

According to Hatakeyama Ziro, he filled shells with poison gas for eight years from 1937 when the factory was built to 1945 when the war ended and he suffered from chronic bronchitis for that.

Meanwhile, Yoshioka Shigeo, who worked at the factory office, said: “We made a written pledge that we would never say about the making of gas bombs. We decided not to talk about it not only during the war but also after it. As we produced gas bombs in violation of the international treaty, we have strictly concealed evidence.”

The crimes the Japanese imperialists committed against humanity in the past can never be erased or eliminated.

The Japanese authorities can never evade the responsibility for the past crimes.