80 Years On: Former Japanese Internee in Ukraine Pained by Russian Invasion

Newsfrom Japan

Society

Sep 3, 2025 10:30 (JST)

Fukuoka, Sept. 3 (Jiji Press)–After World War II, Yasuhiko Ito, a disarmed Imperial Japanese solider, was taken by the former Soviet Union to Ukraine, about 8,000 kilometers from Japan, for forced labor in freezing conditions.

Despite the term “Siberian internment,” the sites of captivity extended across a wide area, including Ukraine, Mongolia and Central Asia.

In an interview conducted before his death in May at the age of 100, Ito, then living in Fukuoka in southwestern Japan, spoke with a pained expression. “My heart aches over Russia’s invasion (of Ukraine). I’m worried that prisoners of war may be interned again,” he said.

In October 1944, at 19, Ito was drafted into the Imperial Japanese Army. He was sent to the Korean Peninsula, then under Japanese colonial rule, and trained in what is now Seoul. On Aug. 15, 1945, standing under the harsh sun in Pyongyang, he strained to hear Emperor Hirohito’s radio address.

The signal was so garbled that he could barely make out the words. Only after his superior explained did he grasp that the Emperor had announced Japan’s surrender. He could hardly believe it.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]

Jiji Press