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`Missing' Japanese veteran to return home 60 years late

A former Imperial Army soldier, who hasn't been seen by his Japanese family since he went off to fight in World War II and was declared among the war dead in 2000, has resurfaced in Ukraine and is returning to Japan to see his relatives after 60 years, the government said.

Ishinosuke Uwano, now 83, was expected to arrive in Japan yesterday, accompanied by his Ukranian son, for 10 days with his surviving relatives in Iwate, about 460km northeast of Tokyo, said Suminori Arima, who is in charge of locating war veterans lost overseas for the Health and Welfare Ministry.

"It's wonderful that Mr. Uwano can make a homecoming visit in good health," Arima said.

Arima declined to say exactly where Uwano had been for the past six decades, nor why he had not been in touch with his Japanese family in all that time.

Uwano was on the island of Sakhalin in Russia's far east when the war ended in August 1945, and was last reported seen on that island in 1958. Arima did not say who reported seeing him there.

He failed to return to Japan and didn't contact any of his relatives there. In 2000 Uwano's family agreed to register him as having died in the war.

But the aging Uwano, who now lives in Ukraine with his Ukranian family, asked someone in his local community to help him track his Japanese relatives.

Inquiries by his acquaintance, whom Arima did not identify, eventually reached the health ministry, which sent staffers to interview Uwano at the Japanese Embassy in Kiev, Arima said.

The Iwate Prefecture government was working to restore his family registry -- a record of all births, marriages, deaths and other information -- to rerecord him as alive.

The ministry refused to provide any more information on Uwano or his Japanese and Ukranian families.

Tokyo believes about 400 World War II veterans remain in the former Soviet Union, including 40 who have been identified.
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