The Taiwan POW Camps Memorial Society, with the co-operation of the Ministry of National Defense, yesterday dedicated a new monument to commemorate senior Allied officers who were imprisoned by the Japanese in a prisoner of war (POW) camp in eastern Taiwan during World War II.
Ministry of National Defense officials, along with British and US officials based in Taiwan, attended the dedication ceremony in front of a military police base in Hualien, the former site of the Karenko POW camp.
The 401 POWs held captive in the camp between 1942 and 1943 included British, US, Australian and Dutch officers, said Michael Hurst, founder and director of the Taiwan POW Camps Memorial Society, the principal force behind erecting the memorial.
Photo: Lin Hsin-han, Taipei Times
Taiwan was a colony of Japan from 1895 to 1945.
“For many years, I’ve had my eye on this site, hoping that one day we can build a POW memorial here,” Hurst said at the ceremony.
After the establishment of a POW memorial near the location of the Taihoku POW camp in Taipei’s Dazhi District in November last year, Hurst said earlier this year he proposed to the defense ministry that a new memorial be erected at the Hualien camp.
Having the memorial at the site will ensure that the stories of the POWs who suffered and died there “have not and will not be forgotten,” he added.
Family members of Britain’s Major General Merton Beckwith-Smith, who died at the Karenko camp on Nov. 11, 1942, traveled to Taiwan to attend the ceremony.
“It is wonderful to be in the place where he died,” said Joanna Reed, one of his granddaughters.
“[It was] a sad day in many ways,” Reed said with tears in her eyes, but she added that it was nice to see the environment in which her grandfather ended his days.
“It was very moving and it was a great tribute to our grandfather and the other prisoners of war who were interned here,” Anne Beckwith-Smith said.
Along with the monument, a sign was also erected telling the story of the camp.
More than 4,360 POWs were held in 14 camps around Taiwan, according to the POW Camps Memorial Society.
The event ended with a wreath-laying ceremony at the memorial.
Established in 1999, the Taiwan POW Camps Memorial Society is dedicated to locating former POW camps.
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co (金阿波羅通信) said today that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon the day before were not made by it, but by a company called BAC which has a license to use its brand. At least nine people were killed and nearly 3,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon yesterday. Images of destroyed pagers analyzed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo. A senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo. "The product was not
COLD FACTS: ‘Snow skin’ mooncakes, made with a glutinous rice skin and kept at a low temperature, have relatively few calories compared with other mooncakes Traditional mooncakes are a typical treat for many Taiwanese in the lead-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but a Taipei-based dietitian has urged people not to eat more than one per day and not to have them every day due to their high fat and calorie content. As mooncakes contain a lot of oil and sugar, they can have negative health effects on older people and those with diabetes, said Lai Yu-han (賴俞含), a dietitian at Taipei Hospital of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. “The maximum you can have is one mooncake a day, and do not eat them every day,” Lai