Shared remembrance of a painful past


Australian servicemen standing guard at the Sandakan Day Memorial during the commemoration ceremony in Sandakan.

WHEN Yoshio Baba, 74, and his son Takao, 41, stood among locals and foreign guests at the Sandakan Day Memorial last Friday, they represented something rarely seen before – Japanese descendants of those who once commanded here, now returning to remember.

Their great-grandfather, Masao Baba, commanded Japanese forces in Borneo during World War II and was executed in 1947 for war crimes.

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