China Urges Japan to Fully Reveal Use of Forced Labor During WWII

The Chinese ambassador to UNESCO asked Japan to fully reveal its use of forced labor before and during World War II.

The Chinese ambassador to UNESCO, Zhang Xiuqin, has said that Beijing wants Japan to fully reveal its use of forced labor before and during World War II, after Tokyo won world heritage status for a set of 19th-century industrial sites.

UNESCO made the decision in favor of Japan on Sunday as it agreed to acknowledge the sites' history of forced labor following months of negotiations between Japan and South Korea.

The Chinese ambassador to UNESCO said that she “had noticed that Japan acknowledged the forced labor history. However, there still lacks an adequate account from Japan of the whole facts surrounding the use of forced labor,” reports China’s media.

Zhang was speaking at the UNESCO meeting in Bonn, Germany, on Sunday. “I urged Japan to face up to the history and to take concrete measures to allow an understanding of the full history of each site,” Zhang said.

Tens of thousands of Koreans were taken to the Japanese industrial sites before and during the Japanese colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.

China had expressed support for South Korea's opposition against the Japanese bid because Chinese people were also forced to work at the Japanese industrial sites from the mid-19th to early 20th century.