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Re: Former POW Prison to be Demolished

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: October 08, 2003

"Singapore to demolish notorious World War Two prison

SINGAPORE, Oct. 8 — Singapore said on Wednesday it will demolish its historic Changi prison where Japanese held more than 70,000 prisoners during World War Two, including thousands of Britons, Australians and many more ethnic Chinese.
     
 The 67-year-old prison is now used as a jail where Singapore carries out executions by hanging at dawn.

 ''It is necessary to redevelop the cluster of prisons at Changi to make way for new prison facilities,'' said Melvin Wong, a spokesman for Singapore's Prisons Department.

       Changi, built by Singapore's former British colonial rulers, became one of Japan's most notorious prisoner of war camps when Singapore fell to Japan in 1942.

       Thousands of soldiers and civilians were starved, worked and tortured there during Japan's occupation of Singapore until 1945.

       The Australian government had campaigned to preserve the site and keep Changi intact. About 15,000 Australian PoWs were held there between February 1942 and September 1945, according to Australian government records.

       ''Changi remains a vital part of the memories and history of Australian PoWs in the Pacific,'' Australian Veteran Affairs Minister Danna Vale said this year.

       ''The name Changi has become synonymous for Australians with the suffering of our PoWs at the hands of the Japanese during World War Two,'' she said. ''Thousands of Australians lived and died at Changi, many of them in the prison building itself.''

       It was from Changi that Japan also shipped many PoWs to work on the Burma-Thailand Railway, known as ''Death Railway'' because of the tens of thousands who died building it.

       Wong said a small part of the prison would be preserved but moved to another site.

Copyright 2003 Reuters Limited"