Justice for war victims
Eighty years after the occurrence of one of the most heinous crimes against humanity, the Nanjing massacre of over 300,000 Chinese by Japanese occupation forces, the records of the atrocities have been added on UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register, granting the gory deed official recognition for remembrance.
For the last two years, Chinese officials have been pursuing their submission with documents and evidence of Japanese occupation forces having conducted the ghastly carnage of civilians and soldiers who laid down their arms in surrender in December 1937.
The Memory of the World Register is the list of documentary heritage under UNESCO’s Memory of the World Programme which was set up in 1992 to “preserve documentary heritage and memory for the benefit of present and future generations in the spirit of international cooperation and mutual understanding, building peace in the minds of women and men”.
UNESCO reached the decision regarding the Nanjing Massacre during a three-day meeting (October 4 to 6, 2015) in Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates, following the 2014-2015 nomination cycle during which 88 submissions from 61 countries were examined. UNESCO’s decision is based on a two-year process where experts rigorously study the nominations with an unbiased attitude.
The verdict must have been facilitated by the documents filed by China, which reportedly are more than convincing, comprising detailed interviews with several victims, a film footage from John Magee—an American priest, and photos taken by the Japanese soldiers depicting their heinous crimes of killing civilians and raping women.
Supporting and confirming each other, the documents presented by China were also proved by numerous previous evidence and recordings, such as John Rabe’s diaries.
It is important for China to pursue the issue relentlessly for two reasons: firstly, to provide closure to the survivors of the Nanjing Massacre and to pay tributes to the sacrifice rendered by the Chinese victims of the odious crime against humanity rather than seek revenge. Secondly, some Japanese conservatives and nationalists have been in a state of denial regarding the atrocities carried out by Japanese forces and have been untruthful in the approach, downplaying the severity of their war crimes regarding the mass execution. The Japanese government prefers to it using the term “incident” for the grisly mass murder.
In the near past, Shinzo Abe, the current Prime Minister of Japan, has deliberately hurt the sentiments of the people of China, Korea, Myanmar and other countries of the region, which Japanese forces had occupied during WW II and wreaked havoc upon. Mr Abe, in total disregard of international sensitivity, blatantly paid homage to the Yasukuni Shrine where Class-A war criminals of World War II are honored. It was a flagrant provocation to the peace-loving people of the entire world, a gross trampling upon historical justice and human conscience, and an outrageous challenge to the outcomes of the world’s victory in the war against fascism and the post-war international order established on the basis of the Charter of the United Nations.
Yasukuni is a Shinto shrine located in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. It was founded by Emperor Meiji to commemorate individuals who had died in service of the Empire of Japan during the Meiji Restoration. The shrine’s purpose has been expanded over the years; the deities enshrined at the Honden shrine within Yasukuni currently include more than 2,466,000 individuals who died in conflicts spanning from the Boshin War of 1867 to the end of World War II.
Controversies and political tension with China and South Korea arose due to the enshrinement at Yasukuni of many war criminals from World War II, including 14 Class A war criminals who committed heinous crimes against the victimised Asian peoples remain honoured there and the historical revisionism in its accounts of Japan’s actions in the War, and intensified following visits by senior government officials such as various prime ministers.
The Japanese leader’s visit to the Yasukuni Shrine in 2013 was, in nature, an attempt to whitewash the history of aggression and colonialism by militarist Japan, decrying international values and norms revered by civilised nations. The move was condemned by every peace loving nation in the world but an unrepentant Abe, rubbing salt in the wound, in April 2015, sent a potted evergreen shrub to mark the spring festival at the Yasukuni Shrine.
Following its defeat at the hands of the Allies in WW II, Japan was bound to limit its armed forces except for self-defence, which being under the protective umbrella of the US, enabled it to divert resources towards development. Unfortunately, Japan’s imperial past has not taught it any lessons and recently, its upper chamber of Parliament approved controversial bills allowing the country’s military to engage in overseas combat in limited circumstances—a major shift after seven decades of pacifism.
Little wonder that Japan, which has been flexing its muscles, has now protested against UNESCO’s decision to list one of the worst atrocities in history on its Memory of the World Register.
Readers may recall that on September 3, 2015, Shinzo Abe not only spurned China’s invitation to attend the 70th anniversary of WW II military parade but also lambasted the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon for his participation in the Victory Day commemoration.
China is meanwhile, setting up a special database and upgrading the protection of documents regarding the Nanjing Massacre after files on the atrocity were listed on the UNESCO Memory of the World Register. The database will enable people to learn more about the historical calamity caused by war.
Progressive nations learn lessons from their past so that they are never repeated. The Germans have taken steps to atone for the grave atrocities committed by Adolph Hitler, which led to WW II and the genocide of Jews. Similarly, other nations too, in a bid to move beyond the pale of dark history, have made serious attempts to move on positively. Under the circumstances, one would expect the otherwise cultured and suave Japanese also to admit the mistakes of their elders and provide closure to the wounds of those they had hurt instead of denying them.
