Two unnamed premier Japanese construction companies, and the Japanese government are being sued for 464M yen by a group of construction workers from China. The party, comprises 20 former workers and the families of 11 workers who have died, claim they were forced to build a power tunnel near Tokyo during the second world war. The suit, filed at the Maebashi district court, alleges the group was forced to work long hours and in harsh conditions. The group was shipped as forced labour from China to Gunma prefecture, north of Tokyo in 1944. After they returned to China at the end of the war, they continued to face suspicions that they were spies working for Japan. Legal insiders said the suit is unlikely to succeed because Japan believed it had settled all outstanding compensation claims after making a cash payment to China several years ago.
