The emperor of Japan, Naruhito, has acknowledged the mistreatment of Dutch soldiers in POW camps as he begins a three-day state visit to the Netherlands.
Naruhito and Empress Masuko laid a wreath at the national war memorial in Dam Square, Amsterdam, at the start of the official visit on Wednesday.
Several dozen former prisoners of war will stage a silent protest at the wreath laying as part of their long-running campaign to secure a formal apology from the Japanese state.
The emperor said before his visit that he wanted to pay respects to people who “continue to bear the pain of those times today” and pledged to “deepen mutual understanding and maintain the spirit of peace.”
Some 19,000 Dutch citizens died during the occupation of Indonesia between 1942 and 1945 and tens of thousands of soldiers were interned in Japanese camps in brutal conditions. Prisoners had carry out forced labour, while some women were forced into sexual slavery.
“Our suffering during the war has never been recognised by a Japanese emperor and sincere apologies have never been given,” Peggy Stein, chair of Indisch Platform 2.0, told AD.nl.
Question of remorse
The wartime emperor Hirohito, who visited the Netherlands in 1971, had wanted to express “remorse” for the war in a speech in 1952, but was deterred by the government of the day, according to diary entries published after his death.
The emperor was allowed to retain his throne when the US occupied Japan after the war, but was stripped of all political power. Recent Japanese governments have been under pressure from right-wing parties not to make formal apologies.
Later on Wednesday, Naruhito will visit the Deltares institute in Delft, which specialises in flood safety, to watch a demonstration of its facilities to simulate the effects of waves and currents on flood defences.
In the evening he will attend a state banquet at the Royal Palace in Amsterdam, before travelling to The Hague on Thursday for lunch with prime minister Rob Jetten at the Mauritshuis museum.
Cherry tree
The emperor will view Johannes Vermeer’s Girl with Pearl Earring, which is being loaned to the Nakanoshima Museum of Art in Osaka for five weeks from mid-August.
On Friday his duties include planting a cherry tree in the Amsterdamse Bos and visiting the monument to the victims of the earthquake and tsunami that devastated parts of his country in 2011.
Relations between the Netherlands and Japan date back from 1600, when a Dutch merchant ship, de Liefde, arrived on the coast of Bungo, now known as Usuki.
The Dutch later established a trading post at Hirado, but were not allowed to settle on the mainland. For centuries they were the only Western country to have trade and diplomatic relations with Japan, where knowledge from the west was known as “Dutch studies”.
Naruhito has been emperor since 2019, following the abdication of his father Akihito, who is still alive.
He arrived in the Netherlands at the weekend and watched the World Cup match between the two countries with king Willem-Alexander and their wives. The match ended in a 2-2 draw.
