Japanese war criminal confessions of murder, biological tests, sexual slavery published

BEIJING — A selection of written confessions by Japanese war criminals after WWII has been published in China, with most of the archives available to the public for the first time, the State Archives Administration said Tuesday.

After Japan's unconditional surrender to China, a total of 1,109 Japanese war criminals were imprisoned in China's Fushun and Taiyuan cities from 1950 to 1956.

Included in the book are photocopied hand-written confessions by Japanese war criminals and detailed records of their interrogation and trial, which serves as irrefutable evidence of Japan's heinous crimes against China during the war, the administration said.

The written confessions detailed crimes such as the killing, enslavement and poisoning of Chinese people. They also confessed to using bacterial and chemical weapons, conducting biological tests on live humans and setting up military brothels with sex slaves for the Japanese army.

The book includes confessions by 842 war criminals, compiled in 120 volumes. The first 50 volumes were published in August 2015.

The book, published by Zhonghua Book Company, is made of the original photocopied texts in Japanese, supplements, corrections, postscripts and the text of Chinese translations at that time, with English translations of the abstract content presented before the relevant written confession.