- Shiro Azuma
(1912 —
January 3 ,2006 ) was a Japanesesoldier who openly admitted his participation inJapanese war crimes against the Chinese during theSecond World War . He was one of the few former soldiers of theEmpire of Japan to admit to his participation in the 1937Nanking Massacre . He died ofcancer onJanuary 3 ,2006 inKyoto .Journal
In 1987, Azuma published his journal, "
My Nanking Platoon ", written during his time in China about theNanjing Massacre . In an interview in 1998, Azuma stated the following:In addition, he described how one of his superior officers,
Mitsuharu Hashimoto , allegedly killed a Chinese civilian. Hashimoto was said to have put a Chinese civilian into a mailbag, soaked it withkerosene , and burned the bag to entertain his comrades. Afterwards, he placed ahand grenade inside the bag and threw it into a river in an effort to create a "stimulating high".Fact|date=May 2008Libel lawsuit
Six years after the publication of the diaries in 1987, Hashimoto and his former commanding officer
Hideo Mori sued Azuma fordefamation of character and fallacious testimony. Hashimoto won the case in both the Tokyo District Court and the Tokyo High Court. In its verdict, the Tokyo High Court stated that because Azuma could not present his hand-written diary documenting theNanking massacre , there was no proof that the diary had not been forged after the war. Azuma then appealed to the Supreme Court of Japan, which also rejected Azuma's appeal. [cite web | last =Takemoto | first =Tadao | title =The Alleged Nanking Massacre: Japan's Rebuttal to China's Forged Claims | url=http://www.geocities.com/tamezounko/nanking/alleged/chapter3.html#chapter3 | accessdate = 2008-05-13]On March 12, 1998, the 86-year old appeared before the Japanese Supreme Court to defend his journal as a valid account of the Nanjing Massacre. However, in the year 2000, his appeal was denied by the Japanese Supreme Court. [cite news | last = | first = | title =Nanjing Massacre diary author Azumo Shiro died | pages = | publisher =People's Daily Online | date =
2006-01-14 | url =http://english.people.com.cn/200601/04/eng20060104_232798.html | accessdate = 2008-05-13]The lawsuits discredited his accounts in
Japan , but they became well-known inChina .See also
*
Nanking Massacre
*Japanese war crimes References
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