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Japanese Soldier Returns Home Over Sixty Years Late

A Japanese soldier from World War Two, who was recently discovered to be living in Ukraine, set foot in his motherland Wednesday for the first time in more than six decades for emotional reunions with surviving relatives. Ishinosuke Uwano, 83, was officially registered as dead by the Japanese Government in 2000, as he had not been heard from since 1958, when he was last reported seen on Russia`s Sakhalin Island.

It was unclear why and how Mr. Uwano, who served in the Imperial Army of Japan on Sakhalin Island until the war`s end in 1945, ended up in Ukraine, a former Soviet territory. In any case, Japanese media has reported that Mr. Uwano moved to Ukraine in 1965 and married a Ukrainian woman. He now has Ukrainian nationality.

Mr. Uwano, who has three children, lives in Zhitomyr west of the Ukrainian capital of Kiev. During a 10-day visit to Japan, Mr. Uwano plans to travel to his home in Iwate, about 450km north of Tokyo, to see relatives and friends and visit the graves of his parents. Since finding Mr Uwano in Ukraine in October, Japan`s Health Ministry has been trying to restore his residency registration.