VICTIMS IN WAKE OF JAPANESE RETREAT

Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5293, 4 January 1947, Page 5

VICTIMS IN WAKE OF JAPANESE RETREAT

NEW GUINEA DEATHS many australians among victims TOKIO, Jan. 3. The War Crimes Tribunal at V )kio, by aljidavits, heard furtlier testimony about mutilations and beheadings. Major ( harles Henry Bicks, of Mel-L.-urne, said he found the bodies ( • six Australians -at Milne Bay in August, 1942. ' Their hands T"ere tied behind their backs and u!l were bayonetted through the stomach. A i'ormer militia captain, Charles Jumdall, of Brisbane, said he ■Yund the bodies of two Australians ti yards from the Japanese head•uarters at Milne Bay in September, i n42. Both were bayonetted. One 1 rd the ears cut oif and was otherv.ise mutilated. Another war prisoner's affidavit \scribed the execution of seven ustralians, including- -a boy, aged ,'ven years, and four women, near Runa, in August, 1942. They were ' c. 1 to a grave, shot, and dumped in i-'c grave by orders of a Japanese . flicer. The court studied two photographs uken by a Japanese so-ldier showing he beheading of an Australian and •vo Ambonese near Aitape, in Sep.emher, 1943. Testimony vcas also resented showing that four Euro/.•ans, including a Roman Catholic ■liest, were executed at Tarawa and 12 fiuropeans were executed at Nau- ' '.i and Ocean Islands. An Australian prosecutor, Lieu- • nant-Colonel T. J. Mornane, subnitted documents shc-wing that " -.panese troops took a particular ■ 'elight in mutilating Allied captives, hoth rnale and female; bayonets and cwords being the most favoured nstruments with which to torture. Lieuf.enant - Colonel Mornane said that during their reteat in New Guinea in 1945 the Japanese left behind the mutilated bodies of Allied persons as a warning to the advancing troops. Most of the victims had been ■ .ripped and their bodies tied to -iakes. The evidence showed the •,-ar of defeat and surrendel- promptd Japanese officers to order tortures. Yhereafter the officers told the troops ■ hat they could never surrender (cause the Allies would retaliate •gainst thc-m with similar atrocitias.