New exhibits reveal atrocities of Unit 731
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E-mail CRI, August 16, 2015
More than 10,000 artifacts used in the commission of biological atrocities against Chinese citizens during World War II are on display at a museum in Haerbin.
![The Museum of Evidence of War Crimes by Japanese Army Unit 731 opens to the public on August 15, 2015. [Photo: Xinhua]](http://images.china.cn/attachement/jpg/site1007/20150816/7427ea210acc173a2c3303.jpg "The Museum of Evidence of War Crimes by Japanese Army Unit 731 opens to the public on August 15, 2015. [Photo: Xinhua]") |
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The Museum of Evidence of War Crimes by Japanese Army Unit 731 opens to the public on August 15, 2015. [Photo: Xinhua] |
Among them are some confidential "special transfer" archives, documents used by Japanese troops whenever captives were sent to the base to be used in experiments.
One of the historic files is of a war-time intelligence agent named Li Pengge, who was captured in 1941 and transferred to Unit 731.
Li's file was then deleted from the prison he had previously been held and his family lost contact with him.
His daughter Li Fengqin, found her father's name in the 'special transfer' archive.
"We went to the relics of the Unit 731 as soon as we found that archive. My brother and I, we mourned for our father. I'd never had the chance to call my father, never. And neither my brother, as he was still a baby then. We knelt down there and for the first time, we called 'father'."
The 1,000 known archives show that those being transferred also included South Koreans and Russians.
Jin Chengmin is the curator of the Museum of War Crime Evidence by Japanese Army Unit 731.
He says these archives are evidence to prove the existence and nature of Unit 731.
"The archives made clear about the human sources, their identities, the number of the victims and their nationalities. So these archives should be the most powerful evidence to prove that Unit 731 used live human beings to do experiments."
Japanese Unit 731 carried out lethal human experiments in the name of biological and chemical warfare research in World War II.
Japan first established a bacteria experiment 70 kilometers outside of Harbin City in 1933 and later a bigger base was built.
Unit 731 withdrew from its base in northeast China in August of 1945, when the Soviet Red Army attacked Japanese troops in the region.
Before leaving, Unit 731 bombed the facilities, destroyed documents and killed witnesses.
Xu Zhanjiang, a researcher from the museum, says this decision also suggest that the Japanese troops intended to cover their cruel and inhumane atrocities in the bases.
"This was because they knew that they were conducting the bacteria warfare, developing the bacteria weapons. The bacteria warfare was against the international convention. It was the most important evidence to declare the emperor as a war criminal in the future. So the Unit 731 came to their mind at once and decided to destroy the evidence."
The museum is located to the east of the former Unit 731 headquarters in Harbin.
Thousands of men, women, and children died during the human experimentation conducted by Unit 731.
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