Japanese Occupation of the Dutch East Indies

World War II finally ended with Japan's capitulation on 15 August 1945. For those who had suffered in Japanese camps, the war ended not a second too soon. Some of these sufferings have been well-documented and are known across the world but there are thousands of victims of cruelty at the hands of the Japanese army whose stories remain relatively unknown.

These include the fates of the Dutch and Indonesians who were living in what was then called the Dutch East Indies, and is now known as Indonesia. When Japan occupied the country, the military had orders to humiliate, starve and kill the Dutch colonisers.

Months after the Japanese invasion, Allied subjects started being rounded up and hoarded into camps. In the camps, at first POWs, but later civilian men, women and children too were subjected to hard labour.

Dogs and snails

The prisoners were often deprived of food and forced to fend for themselves -- eating everything they could get their hands on, from dogs and cats to lizards and snails.

The camps were filthy and diseases such as malaria, dysentery and cholera were rampant. Medicine was sparse to say the least.

Since the orders were to annihilate the Dutch, death ditches had already been dug, the machine guns were ready.

However, the order never came as Japan was forced into capitulation in August 1945 after two atom bombs fell on Hiroshima and Nagasaki respectively.

Long-lasting trauma

The Dutch internees were saved from a cruel death but they never forgot the traumatic experiences they had undergone at the hands of the Japanese occupiers.

Their suffering continues to impact their relations with family and friends, who have become indirect victims of the Japanese terror.

The survivors and families of Japanese war crimes have repeatedly called on Japan to officially acknowledge the crimes committed during the Second World War and apologise.

Every second Tuesday of the month, a group demonstrates in front of the Japanese embassy in The Hague.

However, so far, no Japanese prime minister has made an official apology on behalf of the country. As the victims of Japan's crimes get older, their hopes of an apology are fading.