ILL-TREATMENT BY OWN OFFICERS ALLEGED

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 90, Issue 7, 9 January 1946, Page 5

ILL-TREATMENT BY OWN OFFICERS ALLEGED

AUSTRALIAN’S COMPLAINT

TREATMENT IN JAPANESE PRISON PENS Recd. 6 p.m. Sydney, Jan. 8. Nine members of the Bth. Division last night alleged ill-treatment by their own officers while in Japanese prison pens. All said they would be ready to give evidence at a court of inquiry. Signalman Chris Neilsen stated that five men escaped from the Adam Road camp at Singapore, but returned to take back to hospital one man who was delirious with malaria. They reported the matter to their own officers, and proposed leaving again that night. When almost asleep, *he was arrested by his own officers and guarded by his own section until the Japanese Gestapo took over. He asked a senior officer from Sydney why the action was taken, especially when it was known that the Japanese would execute anyone trying to escape.

The officer’s reply was: “I wasn’t going lo jeopardise the chances of 1000 men and myself in camp for the sake of a few' selfish individuals.”

USED FOR BAYONET PRACTICE Neilsen states that he was then taken to Gestapo headquarters and bashed by two Japanese officers each day for six days. He was then sentenced to death by a Japanese court, and given solitary confinement for 29 days. On the 30th. day the sentence was communed to three years’ solitary confinement. Of (his, he served 14 months. It was during this period that he was placed on a crucifix and used by Japanese for bayonet practice, receiving nearly 200 wounds. Other allegations concerned the ordering of 20 lashes by Australian officers because a man was found in possession of quinine.

A high officer of one force in Burma is said 1o have ordered that certain proportions of the men’s meat should be set aside for himself, because “ke” men should try to make sure of get 1 in fr home."