Chapter

The prisoner of war camp trials

Yuma Totani

Hong Kong's war crimes trials

Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2013

p. 71-94

English

Photocopies

By analyzing a selection of British war crimes trials held in Hong Kong, this chapter assess the British courts' findings on the organizational and individual responsibility of the Japanese military and civilian authorities for the mistreatment of prisoners of war. The British Hong Kong cases are particularly noteworthy because of the inclusion in the groups of defendants of a representative range of the Japanese camp authorities in wartime Hong Kong and Taiwan, thereby allowing an insight into structures, internal workings, and policy dimensions of the Japanese POW administration. They also bring to light the critical part that individuals fulfilled in the workings of POW administration. The rejection of the defence plea of superior orders by the British Hong Kong courts is significant in this respect, since it highlights how critical the acts of individual ranking Army officers and camp staff had been in sustaining the POW camp regime.