https://www.scmp.com/rss/523448/feed The latest stories and articles on Unit 731, a covert military unit of the Imperial Japanese Army, based in the Pingfang District of Harbin, Manchukuo, now Northeast China. Its primary mission was biological and chemical warfare research and development. Active from 1936 to 1945, the unit engaged in lethal human experimentation, including vivisection and disease injection, on prisoners. Unit 731 is infamous for its horrific war crimes and atrocities, leading to thousands of deaths. Its personnel... en https://assets.i-scmp.com/static/img/icons/scmp-meta-1200x630.png https://www.scmp.com Xinlu Liang Xinlu Liang On August 6 last year, atomic bomb survivors held their annual commemorative lantern-floating ceremony at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in Japan. Two months later, their group, Nihon Hidankyo, won the Nobel Peace Prize for decades of campaigning against nuclear weapons. Fifteen years earlier, in Chongshan village in China’s eastern Zhejiang province, Wang Jinti took his last breath. Wang died in near-total obscurity, never having received an apology or compensation for the suffering he... https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3337900/why-chinese-victims-unit-731-and-japans-wwii-bio-warfare-are-still-waiting-justice?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3337900/why-chinese-victims-unit-731-and-japans-wwii-bio-warfare-are-still-waiting-justice?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 28 Dec 2025 04:00:10 +0000 Ling Xin Ling Xin The late Emperor Hirohito of Japan should be held accountable under international law for the crimes of Unit 731, according to Chinese scholars who say the wartime ruler authorised the infamous programme but was shielded from prosecution by US policy after World War II. The secret Japanese military unit in northeastern China, which was responsible for human experimentation, biological warfare and at least tens of thousands of civilian deaths, had been created by imperial order in 1936, said Zhou... https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3337529/china-urged-sue-over-japanese-royals-role-unit-731-crimes?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3337529/china-urged-sue-over-japanese-royals-role-unit-731-crimes?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 24 Dec 2025 04:00:09 +0000 Julian Ryall Julian Ryall A Chinese historical film about Japan’s wartime atrocities has drawn criticism not for its subject matter, but over what many viewers have described as a clumsy portrayal of one of the darkest chapters of World War II. 731 – a drama centred on the Imperial Japanese Army’s notorious biological warfare unit that conducted experiments on Chinese civilians under the guise of disease prevention – premiered on September 18 to coincide with the anniversary of the 1931 Mukden Incident, the false-flag... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3331291/chinese-wwii-film-731s-historical-hiccups-eclipse-anti-japanese-concern?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3331291/chinese-wwii-film-731s-historical-hiccups-eclipse-anti-japanese-concern?utm_source=rss_feed Mon, 03 Nov 2025 05:30:44 +0000 Yuanyue Dang Yuanyue Dang A social media account run by China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has strongly criticised the production and sale of toys depicting Japan’s World War II biological warfare unit, accusing them of promoting a distorted version of history. “On issues of national sentiment and historical justice, there is no room for opportunism or ambiguity,” the account named Junzhengping said in a post on Thursday. It was referring to several building block sets sold on Chinese e-commerce platforms that have... https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3327875/china-slams-toys-featuring-japans-unit-731-known-wwii-atrocities?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3327875/china-slams-toys-featuring-japans-unit-731-known-wwii-atrocities?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 05 Oct 2025 01:00:14 +0000 Ling Xin Ling Xin Sapphire Dingler was shaken as the dark past emerged before her. Dingler, a US master’s student in public history at Southern New Hampshire University, was sifting through newly digitised American archives when she stumbled upon testimony about a Japanese doctor’s grisly wartime experiments on Western prisoners in Tokyo. The doctor was Hisakichi Tokuda, a young and ambitious physician inspired by Unit 731, an imperial Japanese Army base in northern China infamous for biological warfare and... https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3327526/us-records-shed-light-forgotten-western-victims-japans-wwii-human-experiments?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3327526/us-records-shed-light-forgotten-western-victims-japans-wwii-human-experiments?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 01 Oct 2025 13:30:08 +0000 Audrey Jiajia Li Audrey Jiajia Li On September 3, I watched the live broadcast of China’s military parade commemorating the 80th anniversary of the victory in World War II. The perfectly aligned formations, the roaring fighter jets, the cutting-edge unmanned combat systems – the spectacle spoke for itself. Scanning international media, I found commentary interpreting the parade as a show of force by China and Russia against the United States, or warning about the Taiwan Strait and wider region. On Weibo, Chinese sentiment was... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/china-opinion/article/3324655/remembering-chinese-war-pain-deemed-unworthy-west?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/china-opinion/article/3324655/remembering-chinese-war-pain-deemed-unworthy-west?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 09 Sep 2025 01:30:07 +0000 Letters Letters Feel strongly about these letters, or any other aspects of the news? Share your views by emailing us your Letter to the Editor at letters@scmp.com or filling in this Google form. Submissions should not exceed 400 words, and must include your full name and address, plus a phone number for verification A few weeks ago, I had the chance to sit down with a group of students from the National University of Singapore who were visiting Jakarta. We spent the afternoon discussing climate and development... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/letters/article/3321087/give-southeast-asian-youth-formal-role-climate-decision-making?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/letters/article/3321087/give-southeast-asian-youth-formal-role-climate-decision-making?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 08 Aug 2025 03:30:08 +0000 Nancy Wang Nancy Wang A highly anticipated Chinese film that over 3 million users have marked as “want to see” on the Chinese ticket-selling platform Maoyan has sparked discussion on Weibo after its release was changed from July 31 to the more ambiguous “2025”. The film, 731, exposes the grievous biological and chemical experiments committed by Unit 731 of the Japanese Kwantung Army in Northeast China during the Sino-Japanese war and World War II. Directed by filmmaker Zhao Linshan and starring well-known mainland... https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/entertainment/article/3320268/chinese-netizens-riled-over-delay-731-film-about-horrific-japanese-human-experiments?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/entertainment/article/3320268/chinese-netizens-riled-over-delay-731-film-about-horrific-japanese-human-experiments?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 31 Jul 2025 09:15:08 +0000