Bryan Jones in the letter headlined 'Party's crimes' (South China Morning Post, August 20), asks why the Chinese Communist Party and Japan should not acknowledge 'war crimes'. Regarding China, Mr Jones was referring to the 'Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution'.
The simple answer is that whatever happens within any country is for the people of that country to deal with themselves, without foreign interference. Would the United States have tolerated interference in its own civil war against slavery?
Japan's war crimes consisted of cruel aggression against neighbouring countries. All these aggrieved countries are calling for an apology and reparations.
The worst war criminals, chief of whom was emperor Hirohito, were let off the hook by the US under general Douglas MacArthur, in exchange for information and military support by the Japanese aggressors, who supplied information to the US on biological warfare for use during the US' wars of aggression in the half century following World War II.
That is why the US concentrates on what it condemns as crimes in China but is blind to war crimes committed by its allies, including Japanese atrocities in Asia.
ELSIE TU
