Japanese envoys seeking out two Japanese World War II soldiers allegedly hiding in the southern Philippines jungle are to pull out after a failed search, officials said yesterday.
The plan to withdraw was announced amid contradictory reports and growing doubts about the story that the two Japanese "stragglers," supposedly now in their 80s, wanted to emerge from hiding, 60 years after the war ended.
"The Japanese embassy in the Philippines has decided that the embassy staff that has been sent to General Santos city will be recalled to Manila for the time being," said Ekio Egawa, the Japanese consul-general.
Egawa would not say when the Japanese delegation would be pulling out.
He said the decision to withdraw was made after a shadowy Japanese mediator, allegedly in touch with the two soldiers, had told the diplomats that any interviews of the two should be done "at a later date at a more quiet place."
Egawa also cited security concerns that the scores of Japanese and local journalists who came to this southern city to cover the event, might be targeted by guerrillas and kidnapping gangs operating in the hills outside the city.
He refused to disclose further details on the mysterious mediator except to say they would still be in contact with him from the embassy in Manila.
Egawa also would not say they were questioning the credibility of the story or the middleman, remarking that "we will be waiting for further contacts from the mediator."
In Japan, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda had said that "if we see no progress, we are considering sending our diplomats back to Manila."
The self-described Japanese middleman met with the diplomats in the south on Sunday but was not accompanied by the two men. Instead he offered to arrange another meeting.
Japanese broadcaster NHK said the middleman's statements were often contradictory and ambiguous.
"We cannot look for them in large mountain areas that are controlled by guerrillas. We just have to wait for a new contact" from the middleman, Hosoda said.
James Watson — the Nobel laureate co-credited with the pivotal discovery of DNA’s double-helix structure, but whose career was later tainted by his repeated racist remarks — has died, his former lab said on Friday. He was 97. The eminent biologist died on Thursday in hospice care on Long Island in New York, announced the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where he was based for much of his career. Watson became among the 20th century’s most storied scientists for his 1953 breakthrough discovery of the double helix with researcher partner Francis Crick. Along with Crick and Maurice Wilkins, he shared the
China’s Shenzhou-20 crewed spacecraft has delayed its return mission to Earth after the vessel was possibly hit by tiny bits of space debris, the country’s human spaceflight agency said yesterday, an unusual situation that could disrupt the operation of the country’s space station Tiangong. An impact analysis and risk assessment are underway, the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) said in a statement, without providing a new schedule for the return mission, which was originally set to land in northern China yesterday. The delay highlights the danger to space travel posed by increasing amounts of debris, such as discarded launch vehicles or vessel
RUBBER STAMP? The latest legislative session was the most productive in the number of bills passed, but critics attributed it to a lack of dissenting voices On their last day at work, Hong Kong’s lawmakers — the first batch chosen under Beijing’s mantra of “patriots administering Hong Kong” — posed for group pictures, celebrating a job well done after four years of opposition-free politics. However, despite their smiles, about one-third of the Legislative Council will not seek another term in next month’s election, with the self-described non-establishment figure Tik Chi-yuen (狄志遠) being among those bowing out. “It used to be that [the legislature] had the benefit of free expression... Now it is more uniform. There are multiple voices, but they are not diverse enough,” Tik said, comparing it
TOWERING FIGURE: To Republicans she was emblematic of the excesses of the liberal elite, but lawmakers admired her ability to corral her caucus through difficult votes Nancy Pelosi, a towering figure in US politics, a leading foe of US President Donald Trump and the first woman to serve as US House of Representatives speaker, on Thursday announced that she would step down at the next election. Admired as a master strategist with a no-nonsense leadership style that delivered for her party, the 85-year-old Democrat shepherded historic legislation through the US Congress as she navigated a bitter partisan divide. In later years, she was a fierce adversary of Trump, twice leading his impeachment and stunning Washington in 2020 when she ripped up a copy of his speech to the
RSS