Ukishima Maru

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Ukishima Maru

History
Japan
Launched	March 1937
Fate	Sank 24 August 1945
General characteristics
Tonnage	4,731 GRT

Ukishima Maru was a Japanese naval transport vessel. She was originally built as a passenger ship in March 1937. During World War II, she served as a naval vessel after receiving heavy armament. She measured 4,731 gross register tons.

The Ukishima Maru incident[]

On 22 August 1945, after the surrender of the Japanese Empire following the Second World War, Ukishima Maru was ordered to carry 3,725 Korean labourers and their families from Japan's military facility in the Aomori Prefecture back to the Korean port of Busan. On the 24th, after sailing from Aomori to Maizuru, the ship exploded and sank, killing 524 Koreans and 25 Japanese on board according to Japanese government figures. However, the actual numbers of passengers and victims are unknown. For example, the independent investigation conducted by the association of Koreans in Japan at the time concluded that 6,500 out of 8,000 Korean passengers were killed or missing from the explosion. ^[1]

The Japanese government officially reported that the ship struck an American naval mine and exploded, but the accuracy of the report is contested by numerous Koreans including the survivors from the incident.

The Korean view[]

Numerous Koreans, including the survivors from the incident, maintain the view that the explosion was a deliberate action by the Japanese imperial government, likely to eliminate and silence the Korean labourers who could act as the witnesses of the Japanese war crimes^[2] or share the information about the military base.

According to the witness accounts from the seven Korean survivors, the Japanese marines threw the documents and other items off the ship, and some to many of the marines left the ship in smaller boat before the explosion.^[3] Additionally, another survivor Jeong Gi-young also stated that he overhead the Japanese marines, who were looking at the woman feeding her baby on board and said it was such a pity that the baby was going to die soon at young age without ever fully blooming.^[3] Kang Yi-sun, also the survivor from the incident, stated that he witnessed many Japanese marines on the ship strangely running to the engineering room and disappearing prior to the explosion.^[4] The survivor Jang Yeong-do recalled that the rumor, which said that the ship was going to explode if it was to change its course from Busan, was already circulating around the vessel.^[5]

In 2016, the team from the Research Institute of Korean and Japanese Cultural Studies led by Kim Moon-gil obtained the document of the Japanese government instructing the ships including Ukishima Maru to discard the loaded explosives less than three hours prior to the departure. With neither witness accounts nor records of the explosives ever being discarded from the ship, Kim and others suggest that Ukishima Maru likely left with the explosives on board.^[2] Kim also argued that only 25 out of 300 Japanese crews on board died compared to the thousands of the Korean passengers who were never officially reported, suggesting that many Japanese crews were aware of the planned explosion and escaped by boats as the Korean survivors witnessed. Meanwhile, the Korean passengers were unaware and thus killed in much large number by the sudden explosion.^[2] According to the incident report the team also found in 2019, a Japanese naval admiral told the officers of the ship to sacrifice their lives by completing the duty when the officers protested that they did not want to sail through the dangerous area.^[5]

The Japanese Court Ruling[]

Eighty South Koreans, including the survivors and relatives of the incident's victims, have filed the lawsuit against the Japanese government, seeking the monetary compensation, official apology, and return of the victims' remains from Japan to South Korea.

On 27 August 2001 the Kyoto District Court ordered the Japanese government to pay ¥45 million to 15 South Koreans, including the survivors and relatives of the victims from the incident. The court ruled that the Japanese government had failed in its duty to transport passengers safely, which was bound as the established legal relation between the government and the passengers at the time.

The court rejected, however, claims of the plaintiffs demanding official apologies and return of the victims' remains. The court also rejected the claims of 65 plaintiffs on the ground that their relationship with the victims could not be established.

The order of compensation by the Kyoto District Court, however, was rejected in 2003 by the High Court of Osaka. The case was ultimately rejected by the Superior court in November, 2004.

References[]

• "Korean "Titanic" Amazes Moscow And Hong Kong Audience; To Be Exported to West". The People's Korea. 25 July 2001. Archived from the original on 27 September 2007.
• "Ukishima Maru" (in Japanese).