Sook Ching Massacre. February-March 1942
The Sook Ching massacre was the planned elimination of the Chinese population of Singapore following its capture by the Japanese from the British. It was later extended to include the Chinese population of Malaysia. Officially Japan admits that approximately 5,000 Chinese were killed in the massacre, estimates by western scholars and others set the total as high as 70,000.
The massacre was planned and military units established for the purpose of carrying it out well before the Japanese attack on Singapore. It was documented in a paper entitled, “Implementation Guideline for Manipulating Overseas Chinese” in late December 1941.
Once Singapore was in Japanese hands the secret police (Kempeitai) began screening the Chinese and other Asian population for individuals deemed to be undesirables. All Chinese males between the ages of 18 and 50 were screened, most were then killed. Women and children were sometimes screened as well. The age limits were at the discretion and judgment of the screener rather than based on official documents. Those few who passed the screening were issued square ink stamps on their arms, the rest were marked with a triangle. They were then trucked to one of multiple killing sites.
Upon arrival at the sites the Chinese were murdered, some by firing squad, some by machine-gunning, some by beheading, and some by bayoneting. Mass graves have been discovered at eleven sites on the Malay Peninsula. British prisoners awaiting transportation to POW camps later reported hundreds of bodies washed up near the former golf course where they were interned.
In the mid-1960s an independent Singapore demanded that Japan apologize and make reparations for the massacre. The Japanese government agreed to pay $50 million to Singapore – half in the form of a loan to be repaid – and refused to apologize for the event.