[/floatr]Moscow Times: Japan's POWs Helped Build Tashkent
One of the most striking architectural monuments in Uzbekistan, the Navoi opera theater, combines European baroque style with traditional Muslim ornamentation, paying homage to the country's mixed cultural influences. It's also a testament to the role played by thousands of Japanese soldiers and officers who were taken prisoner in the last days of World War II and forced to labor in Soviet Uzbekistan. In addition to the 1947 theater, the captive Japanese built another theater, three plants, a 120-kilometer high-tension transmission line and a hydropower plant. The Soviet press lauded the construction as a heroic deed of the Soviet people, never mentioning the captive laborers who were never paid..."If civilians treated German prisoners like enemies, the Japanese were looked upon as tired wanderers far from home"...more...
