Spotlight: Chiune Sugihara - The Japanese Schindler | Tokyo Weekender
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Matthew HernonSpotlight
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Summary
We begin with Chiune Sugihara, the man known as the “Schindler of Japan.” In 2016, he was voted number one in a TW poll asking Tokyo residents to name this country’s greatest ever person. Taking matters into his own hands, he issued 10-day visas for transit through Japan. On top of that, he used his Russian skills to negotiate with Moscow officials to ensure refugees could pass through the Soviet Union and would be able to leave Vladivostok for Japan. As most of those involved included dependents, it’s estimated that somewhere between 6,000 and 10,000 people were able to escape thanks to the selflessness of Sugihara and Zwartendijk, though the official number will never be known. He was an influential lawyer who spoke to Sugihara about issuing visas for refugees. “Warhaftig was able to connect my father and Moshe to Sugihara,” says Wajsbrod’s daughter Faye Honor. Most of their families were murdered during the war but they were able to get out thanks to those visas from Sugihara. Numerous books, documentaries and films have been written about him, including the 2015 movie Persona Non Grata.“My father did what he felt was right even if there were repercussions,” Sugihara’s only surviving son Nobuki Sugihara told us in 2016. Commercial attaché Jehoshua Nishri, whose family had been saved by a visa [my father] issued, managed to track him down after trying unsuccessfully through the ministry of foreign affairs numerous times.
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