Harbin 731 Museum
"I have done what no human being should ever do," said Yoshio Shinozuka, a former member of the Japanese army's notorious Unit 731 who considered himself a war criminal, BBC reported.
Yoshio Shinozuka and other Japanese veterans have testified in Tokyo court that they mass-produced cholera, dysentery, anthrax and typhoid in Harbin, now capital of northeastern province of Heilongjiang, until 1945 to use mostly against the Chinese civilians and prisoners of war (POWs).
The veterans of Unit 731 confessed they had taken part in dissections of prisoners who were still alive.
Unit 731
"Unit 731 was a special division of the Japanese Army, a scientific and military elite. It had a huge budget specially authorised by the Emperor, to develop weapons of mass destruction that would win the war for Japan. America and Germany had their nuclear arms race. Japan put its faith in germs," reported the BBC.
"Unit 731 was the world's largest and most comprehensive biological warfare programme. Inside Unit 731 the Japanese conducted research and human experimentation on a scale unlike any in the history of humankind.
More than 10,000 Chinese, Korean and Russian POWs were slaughtered in these experimental facilities. They were used as human laboratory rats, to research, breed and refine biological weapons.
They were treated as sub-human, and live vivisections were common. The products of the research were tested on Chinese civilians. It is estimated that biological weapons killed more than 300,000 between 1938 [and] 1945," according to the BBC.
Skeleton In The Cupboard
"As the war came to an end, the Japanese surrendered and the US moved in to run the country's affairs, the officers and scientists responsible were never brought to trial.
The US military got wind of what the Japanese had been working on and immediately grasped two points: They would never be able to conduct that type of human experimentation at home. And that the research had to be kept from the Russians at all costs.
So the US cut the Japanese officers a deal: Immunity from prosecution for war crimes in return for experimental data," the BBC analysed.
The witnesses said Japan's military headquarters ordered the Unit 731 to destroy evidence when the United States dropped the second atomic bomb on Nagasaki.
Justice Denied
Unit leaders later landed top jobs at universities and pharmaceutical companies, keeping their identities secret.
The Japanese Government had acknowledged that Unit 731 existed but has refused to confirm the soldiers' accounts. Yoshio Shinozuka said precedents indicated that Japan was unlikely to apologise.
Tokyo's High Court upheld the ruling of the District Court, which acknowledged Japan's involvement in biological warfare experiments and spreading infectious diseases in World War II in China, but rejected demands for a formal apology and claims for compensation from nearly 200 Chinese victims.
The plaintiffs will take their case to the Japanese Supreme Court.
Harbin 731 Museum-related Links:
731 Museum in Harbin
Harbin Tourist Office
Heilongjiang Tourist Office
Harbin Government
Heilongjiang Government
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