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Chiune Sugihara - Japan's Schindler

thomas

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I found this article on Chiune Sugihara on Kyodo. By the way, here's more info on Mr. Sugihara.

The story: http://books.japanreference.com/jump.cgi?ID=14

A book review: http://books.japanreference.com/review.cgi?ID=14

Interview with "Japan's Schindler" made public

GIFU A museum in Gifu Prefecture on Tuesday recorded an interview given by Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese diplomat known as "Japan's Schindler," available to the general public.

Sugihara rescued thousands of Jews from the Holocaust by issuing them transit visas when he was consul general in the then Lithuanian capital of Kaunas from 1938 to 1940. The museum located in his hometown, Yaotsu, has a reproduction of his office at the time, and visitors can use headphones to listen to Sugihara's reasons for deciding to issue visas in defiance of Japanese government policy. "It was a humanitarian issue. Jews were trying to flee because they were about to be taken to Auschwitz. Thousands of them, saying they have no place to go and requesting visas, flocked to the window of where I was staying," Sugihara says on the tape. The recording of the interview, conducted in Moscow in August 1977, when Sugihara was 77, was donated to the museum by a former Moscow bureau chief of the Japanese broadcasting company Fuji Television Network.

Source: Kyodo News
 
Court battle over tale of the 'Japanese Schindler'

A book about an Israel-honoured Japanese wartime hero is being blocked ... by his wife.


When hundreds of desperate men, women and children suddenly appeared at Chiune Sugihara's home, the Japanese diplomat faced a stark choice.

It was the summer of 1940 in Kaunas, Lithuania, and the crowd before him -- tired, dishevelled, frightened -- were mostly Polish Jews fleeing from the Nazis and almost certain death. The British, American and French consuls had already turned down their pleas for transit visas to escape via the Soviet Union. Under explicit orders to do the same, Sugihara was their last hope.

He agonised for two days before announcing to the waiting refugees: 'I'll issue visas to every one of you to the last. So please wait patiently.'

It was a defining moment. By defying his masters in Tokyo, Sugihara instigated one of the largest mass escapes of Jews in history. Yet even today, 16 years after his death, a bitter battle is raging over the reputation of the man now regarded as 'Japan's Schindler'. Last Thursday, the Tokyo District Court resumed a defamation case in which Sugihara's widow, Yukiko, is suing the Jewish historian responsible for the most in-depth study of her husband. She claims the book -- In Search Of Sugihara -- besmirches his reputation and contains hundreds of distortions and inaccuracies. Her daughter-in-law Michi says the contents were so terrible Yukiko was ill in bed for two months after reading it.

She is demanding 10 million (£52,000) in damages and wants sales of the Japanese version halted. The book is a positive account of Sugihara, whom the author, Professor Hillel Levine, places in the same class as figures such as Gandhi. 'Sugihara is so compassionate that he was able to make goodness itself contagious and bring out the best even in bad people,' says Levine.

He has also received the support of one of Sugihara's three sons, Nobiko, who has pledged to testify in court in his defence.

Sugihara's actions mirror the industrialist Oskar Schindler, who rescued more than 1,200 Jews from the death camps. But the number saved by Sugihara appears far greater.

As Japanese vice-consul, he spent August of 1940 hand-writing visas. After being forced to close the consulate by occupying Soviet authorities, he threw unsigned visas from a train window as it pulled away from the station.

Of the 2139 holders of his visas, the vast majority are believed to have made it along the Trans-Siberian railway to Japan. As they represented only household heads, up to 10,000 lives were saved.

Although Sugihara's achievement was astonishing, he died unrecognised in his own country. Yukiko, now 88, maintains her husband was forced to resign when he returned to Tokyo in 1947 because of his lifesaving actions in Lithuania. Working in a series of non-descript jobs, he lived out the rest of his days in shame.

But Levine, a professor of sociology and religion at Boston University, draws a different conclusion. For four years, he tried to find out why Sugihara took such a great personal risk, knowing he risked being killed if the Nazis found out he had given visas to Jews.

Levine pored over official archives worldwide and interviewed hundreds of people, including Yukiko and other Sugihara family members. His book paints a complex picture of a hero who was also ordinary and vulnerable. Levine relates an anecdote of how Sugihara once visited a brothel. He also reveals the existence of a first wife, a Russian woman who married and divorced Sugihara in his youth.

Rather than a career diplomat, Levine contends that Sugihara, fluent in several languages, was a spy distracted by the welfare of the desperate Jews. He believes Sugihara would have been executed immediately if his superiors had been dismayed by his actions. Instead, he was promoted before being asked to leave the service on his return to Tokyo in 1947 -- a fate that befell 90% of diplomats in an occupied country which suddenly had little requirement for overseas representation.

The family sorely disputes Levine's belief that Sugihara was a spy. Observers believe many other disputed points are more likely cultural misunderstandings than factual misrepresentations. In the book, Levine describes Sugihara's enormous capacity to 'drink but not get drunk' an ability he says was used with great aplomb to charm and befriend 'hardened Soviet commissars'.

It was this relationship, says Levine, which was essential to ensure the safe passage of the Jews through the Soviet Union to Japan. 'I am accused of slandering him as an alcoholic,' says Levine. 'I did no such thing. I represented his drinking in a very positive way.'

Yukiko's youngest son, Nobiko, says he has known the author for at least a decade and continues to regard him as an honest and hardworking historian.

In a letter to Yukiko and her supporters, Nobiko states: 'I know that the allegations made against him are false and that if law suits did not threaten him, he would be able to explain any of the questions that have come up about the facts and interpretations in his book.

'I know he would genuinely want to do this and is also pained by any hurt he may have unintentionally caused my mother in trying to tell the glorious story of Sugihara and his rescue efforts.

'I also know that my mother, who is very old, has been suffering from memory lapses. Under these circumstances, people have seriously exploited her to make statements that she would not have made had she been more lucid.'

The court case marks the latest chapter in a story that went largely unnoticed before Sugihara's death. Israel has named him 'one of the righteous among nations', an honour bestowed on individuals, including Oskar Schindler, for their help to Jews in escaping the Holocaust.

But it wasn't until 2000 that the Japanese government officially honoured him. The move only came about after sustained pressure from his family and Jewish groups and helped in their eyes to regain Sugihara's lost reputation.

It is a reputation that Yukiko and her supporters are now fighting to protect in court. Levine's work, first published in English in 1996 and translated into Japanese in 1998, has played a significant role in elevating Sugihara's achievement to the international stage.

He set out to discover how a seemingly ordinary man like Sugihara could become a great rescuer to solve the 'mystery of goodness'.

But he remains at a loss as to why he now finds himself in the dock and questions why his detractors took so long to launch the action.

'As a historian, my responsibility was to interpret Sugihara accurately,' he says. 'If this were happening in the United States, it would be laughed out of court. I'm very upset about it, but among my Japanese friends, colleagues, writers and academics worldwide, there is a clear understanding of the value of my work and its integrity.'

The case has been adjourned until January to consider written submissions.

01 December 2002



=> http://www.sundayherald.com/29665
 
Yukiko, now 88, maintains her husband was forced to resign when he returned to Tokyo in 1947 because of his lifesaving actions in Lithuania. Working in a series of non-descript jobs, he lived out the rest of his days in shame.
...
Levine relates an anecdote of how Sugihara once visited a brothel. He also reveals the existence of a first wife, a Russian woman who married and divorced Sugihara in his youth.

That might explain why his wife takes it so personally. Honour inside Japan seems more important than outside to her. Losing a diplomatic post to end up living in shame must have been hard. Then talking about his first Russian wife (Russian are not well considered in Japan, maybe because of the conflict about those islands near Hokkaido that is still a hot issue between the 2 countries). I guess she just doesn't see the importance of saving foreign lives during the war if it's to loose one's reputation and name at home. Very old-fashioned, narrow, egotist and proud mentality.
 
It's sad, but well, she's a really old lady. Once her daughter will be responsible for Chiune's heritage things will change.

I wonder how many people in Japan know Chiune Sugihara.
 
Here's another impressive personality, a torch-bearer of enlightenment who passed away last Sunday.

Textbook crusader dies

Historian Saburo Ienaga, who had fought against the Education Ministry's textbook screening for decades, claiming that the system is aimed at covering up Japan's wartime atrocities, has died at the age of 89, it was learned Sunday. [...]

To ensure that school textbooks were written in line with the spirit of the post-war Constitution, he fought against the Education Ministry's textbook screening system for decades.


=> http://mdn.mainichi.co.jp/news/20021201p2a00m0fp008000c.html
 
Here's another article on Mr. Sugihara. It's obvious why his wife is trying to prevent the publication of Levine's book.

Japan's WWII 'Schindler' leaves a controversial legacy

The scholar says that - far from being a heroic individual who put his conscience before his country - the diplomat was a spy who issued visas on government orders to curry favour with the powerful Jewish community in the US when many in Japan were still trying to avoid war.

Levine's book also questions Sugihara's squeaky-clean image with anecdotes about him visiting a "soapland" brothel and using his impressive alcohol tolerance to win over Russian commissars.

Perhaps most shocking to the Sugihara family, the author also uncovered a Russian woman who married and divorced the diplomat in his youth - a subject Yukiko knew nothing about or chose not to mention.



Statue honouring 'Japan's Schindler' unveiled in LA's Little Tokyo

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/A/JPArticle/PrinterFull&cid=1039853906024
 
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If been reading something about him a couple of weeks ago, and it made me smile.

Saving so many Jewish people, thought Japan was ( maybe not at that time, but later on) allied with Germany.



For more information, check wiki

 
Dutch Baka said:
Saving so many jewish people, thought Japan was ( maybe not at that time, but later on) allied with Germany.

Saving these people was his personal choice, he actually ignored directives not to issue visas to Jewish refugees. NHK aired a Japanese docudrama based on Sugihara's story in January or February, if I remember correctly.
 
Tojo was also nominated in Golden bookツ

there are two japanese commanders in that
 
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The story started just after World War 1. In Siberia there were more than 100,000 Polish people who could not return to Poland. Their life was very hard.

They were very cold and sick, with little food. It was especially terrible for the children whose parents had died. The Polish adults in Siberia thought, "It is okay if we die here without ever going back to Poland. But we must send these children back to Poland". They organized a relief group that worked to find support for the suffering children. They tried to ask Europe and America for support so that the children could be sent back to Poland. But no one helped them...........

Finally they asked Japan. A leader arrived in Japan and visited the Japanese government to ask them to help the Polish children in Siberia. The Japanese government listened to them very carefully and decided to accept their request. Only for seventeen days! Two weeks later the Japanese sent a ship to Siberia. A total of 765 Polish children came to Japan. They found the Japanese at that time were so very kind and warmhearted...............

 
The Chubu region in central Japan, a popular destination for Israelis, given its association with Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese diplomat who issued visas to Jews fleeing the Nazis during World War II, sees tourism falter amid the Israel-Hamas war. Hundreds of Israelis have cancelled trips to Takayama, Sugihara's birthplace.

The Hotel Associa Takayama Resort, in the region's Gifu prefecture, has catered to travelers from Israel, providing kosher menus. But of the roughly 2,500 people who have booked stays in October and November, about 2,000 have canceled or are considering canceling. Travel agents in Israel are unable to access their offices and have been contacting clients from shelters, according to Hotel Associa. The hotel has decided not to charge cancellation fees for Israeli guests. The cancellations mark a setback for the hotel just as traffic had recovered from pandemic lows. "Sales are of course taking a hit," said a Hotel Associa representative. "This has been devastating on the emotional level as well."

Paywall alert:
 
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