◆ITO　Takashi◆

Not all the victims of the atomic bombs dropped by the U.S.military on Japan were Japanese.They included Koreans-50,000 in Hiroshima and and 20,000 in Nagasaki-who had been brought against their will to Japan by the Japanese Army for forced labor.The victims also included small numbers of Chinese,Allied prisoners of war,and Japanese - Americans who had stayed in their hometowns.
　Some Korean victims were denied first aid because of discrimination.Many Korean conscripts in the Japanese army were affected by large amounts of residual radiation as they collected the dead in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
　After Japan's defeat,some 23,000 Korean atomic-bomb survivors made their way to their liberated homeland;5,000 remained in Hiroshima and 2,000 in Nagasaki.
　At first,doctors in hospitals in the Republic of Korea knew little about radiation sickness and were unprepared to treat it. When treatment became available, it was very expensive. In the succeeding decades,poor health made it hard for the victims to work, and the expensive treatment kept them poor. About half of the Korean atomic - bomb survivors are still in financial straits.
　The Japanese goverment plants to build a Center for Atomic - Bomb Survivors in South Korea but refuses to compensate individuals. Now,after decades of poverty and chronic illness,the Korean victims are dying off one after another.