Page 82 - MaterialsTrial-JapaneseArmy-1950

whole batches of them being received from the gendarmerie by the personnel of the
detachment's lst Division. They (the prisoners) were confined in two blocks of the prison. . . .

... If a prisoner survived the inoculation of lethal bacteria, this did not save him from a
repetition of the experiments, which were continued until death from infection supervened.
The infected people were given medical treatment in order to test various methods of cure,
they were fed normally, and after they had fully recovered, were used for the next
experiment, but infected with another kind of germ. At any rate, no one ever left this death
factory alive.

Following anatomical study the bodies of the dead were burned in the detachment's
incinerator. . . .

... On numerous occasions during my service in the detachment I inspected, together with
General Ishii, various departments of the detachment, including the prison, and hence I know
some details about the system, regime and maintenance of the prison inmates.

The prisoners were delivered to the prison through a secret tunnel dug under the facade of
the central building. The detachment's gendarme department had at its disposal several
special motor vehicles painted in dark colour, with no windows, and with a ventilation hole.
In these vehicles the prisoners were delivered from the penal bodies to the prison of
Detachment 731.

The prison office gave each prisoner designated for experimentation a number, which was
his until he died. . . .

In the five years that the detachment was located at Pingfan Station, that is, from 1940 to
1945, not less than 3,000 persons passed through this death factory, and were killed by being
infected with lethal bacteria. How many died before 1940, I do not know. . . .

... In April 1941, just after I arrived to take up my post in the detachment, I inspected the
prison, and in one of the cells I saw two Russian women, one of whom had a year-old child,
born in the detachment's prison. During the period I was with the detachment these women
were alive. Their subsequent fate I do not know, but at any rate these women could not have
left the prison alive, and the same lot as that of the other prisoners must have befallen them. .
. .

Kawashima

INTERROGATORS

Military Prosecutor,' Member of the staff

Captain of Jurisprudence BELYUGA of the Office of the Ministry

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