The confessions of Japanese war criminal Hiroshi Jōno

According to the written confession of Hiroshi Jōno in January 1955, he was born in Nagasaki City, Japan in 1914. He joined the war of aggression in northeast China in 1938 and was arrested in April 1949.

File photo of Hiroshi Jōno

Major offences:

1941: plundered China’s resources to "strengthen the supply of Japanese military resources, such as iron";

From November 1943 to August 1945: "dispatched more than 1,500 reserve soldiers in four batches to cooperate with the Japanese army in attacking the Chinese people and the Eighth Route Army; dispatched two battalions to cover for the exploitation of coal and iron, and used the security forces to cover the collection of 150,000 tons of grain and about 200,000 tons of iron in the whole province for the Japanese army";

From 1946 to 1949: "I took part in the battles waged by Yan Xishan for five times to fight the people and resist the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), causing over twenty hundred casualties to the PLA and extremely huge damages to the local inhabitants";

October 1948: "I planned with Housaku Imamura to let the 10th Brigade join in the battles in Dongshan, Taiyuan, causing about 1,000 casualties to the PLA and organizing (blocking) the liberation of Taiyuan." "I saw more than ten gas shells dropped on the position of the PLA and exploded."