There is more malnutrition and disease than originally believed among prisoners in Admiral Mountbatten's area. The original estimate gave the total of all prisoners at 85,000. Latest reports from parachute teams, underground sources and Japanese officials put the total now at 115,000.

A survey of sick at Singapore shows beri beri cases 21,000, malaria 1100, bacillic dysentery 400, amoebic dysentery 1000, and TB 359, a total of 23,859. In view of these figures, the anticipated evacuation of all Australian prisoners in six weeks may be over optimistic.

Since the surrender at Tokio, the Japanese have been reported to be cooperative in all areas. There has been some movement of prisoners, which the British ordered to cease to avoid a repetition of marches endangering the sick.

It is estimated, though not substantiated, that of 16,320 AIF men taken prisoner by the Japanese in 1942, 5000 have lost their lives. AIF records at the office of Changi convict camp, in the eastern part of Singapore Island, where 1589 Australians were concentrated, prove that 2563 have died since the Eighth Division was captured. The remainder are scattered in camps in Thailand and Malaya, and an accurate count is impossible as yet. Of 3480 taken prisoner in the Netherlands East Indies, 444 are known to be dead. Many Australians were lost among 5000 trapped when a Japanese ship was torpedoed while bound for Japan. It is understood that conditions are disastrous at Palembang, where 70 prisoners, including women and children, died in May. There were 35 nurses in this camp.

Four Australian nurses have been located in Hong Kong, but the Australian mission to SEAC has no information about Eighth Division sisters, of whom 40 or 50 sailed from Singapore to Java on the night of February 12, 1942. Their ship was sunk. It was reported that 33 sisters reached Sumatra after taking to rafts. Their whereabouts now is unknown.

September 6: Watched by 1000 officers, ratings and marines on the flight deck of HMS Glory, Lieut-General Hitoshi Imamura signed the surrender today of 139,000 Japanese in Rabaul, New Ireland, the Solomons, New Guinea and other islands.

As Imamura handed over his sword to Lieut-General VAH Sturdee, GOC First Australian Army, Glory's Corsairs victory-rolled above the flight deck. At Imamura's request, Vice-Admiral Jin-ichi Kusaka, Commander-in-Chief of the Japanese South-eastern Fleet, also signed, each using his own brush and ink. Both signed with large Japanese characters, and Imamura added his signature in English.

Glory stood off Rabaul Bay during the ceremony.

A heart-rending story, which for the first time exposes the hardships suffered by the men who built the Bangkok-Moulmein railway, was told by Private Maurice Ferry, of Kensington, Sydney. Ferry revealed that:

In three months 800 out of 1900 died.

The funeral pyres were never out for months.

Men worked 14 hours a day and then tried to sleep in roofless, filthy huts.

When moved to a non-working camp, each railway truck contained at least six dead.

There was a collection of bodies outside each hut of those who died during the night.

At the end of November, 1943, all prisoners in North and Central Thailand were evacuated to a camp at Kanburi, South Thailand, where the food was better, but within a fortnight another 1800 died as a result of their experiences. They were buried in a common grave. Those who survived had bodies swollen with beri beri.

"We returned to Singapore in time for Christmas, 1943. It was not a very merry Christmas."

The atrocities committed by the Japanese in Borneo against Australian prisoners of war will not be revealed to the Australian public as soon as the prisoners are liberated at Kuching and Sandakan. The army authorities at Labuan have made it clear that war correspondents will be permitted to interview the prisoners, but that their stories of atrocities will be held until the next of kin are advised and it is known that all prisoners have been located and liberated. The fear that some reprisals may be taken against prisoners in remote areas, and that responsible war criminals will hide in the Borneo hinterland, has prompted this decision.

Australian troops will begin landing in Rabaul, headquarters of the Japanese South-eastern Army, probably on Monday. This was intimated to the Japanese commander in chief (Lieut-General Imamura) at the surrender signing on HMS Glory, says the Department of the Army. Troops will be from the 11th Division, commanded by Major-General KW Eather. Armoured units will accompany the occupation forces, who will be the first to return to Rabaul since the Japanese overwhelmed the small Australian garrison in 1942. Plans are well advanced for the concentration of 89,000 Japanese still in the Rabaul area.

Despite earlier forecasts that 5000 Australian prisoners of war were located in South-east Asia, it now appears that almost 13,000 are in that area. The Minister for the Army (Mr Forde) said estimates showed that 6600 prisoners were in Singapore and Malaya, 4648 in Siam, 256 in French Indo-China, 243 in Sumatra, and possibly 1181 in Java, although the number might be only 370. Of the total in the South-east Asia sector, about 30 per cent were known to be sick.

September 9: Lieutenant-General Teshima, commander of the Second Japanese Army, today surrendered his forces in Borneo and the whole of the Netherlands East Indies, east of Lombok, to General Sir Thomas Blamey. Tens of thousands of Japanese troops are involved. Lombok is an island near the eastern tip of Java. Members of American, Netherlands, Royal Australian Navy, AIF, RAAF and Australian Army Nursing Service assembled in ceremonial parade in Morotai sports oval. The surrender table was at the end of the oval, with the Union Jack, Stars and Stripes, Southern Cross and Netherlands flag flying from four poles. The Japanese envoys stood at attention for 10 minutes until General Blamey entered. All Japanese armed forces under Japanese control in Dutch Borneo have surrendered to the Australian Army.

Australia would see that all Japanese war criminals were punished, particularly the commandants and guards of prison camps, said the Minister for the Army (Mr FM Forde).

"The Japanese have committed too many atrocities on our men to be allowed to go scot free," said Mr. Forde, commenting on statements that the Japanese were being handled in a "kid glove" fashion. "Australians can rest assured that the Government will see that guilty Japanese will be punished. That is the Government's policy, and it will be carried out," he added.

The first Australian prisoners of war to leave Singapore for Australia would be embarked on September 14. "It is not yet possible to announce when the ships will arrive in Australia. Naval authorities have advised us to keep these ship movements secret as there are still Japanese submarines unaccounted for."

Newcastle and district men of the RAAF, members of a party of 720 officers and other ranks who reached Sydney on Sunday aboard the liner Orion, told of life in German and Italian prisoner of war camps. The returning airmen, all liberated prisoners of war, were given a rousing reception from the time the Orion entered the Heads until they reached Bradfield Park. Small boats, tugs and ferries milled about the ship as she moved slowly down the harbour to her berth at Woolloomooloo. Thousands of people lined both sides of the streets adjacent to the wharf and slopes of the lower Domain. Some of the men told stirring stories of their forced marches across Germany last winter away from the advancing Russians, of how they begged or stole food to sustain them and lived in daily terror of being strafed and bombed by their own aircraft, which happened on several occasions.

Warrant Officer Ted Solway, of Weston, is home again after four and a half years' service. He had 12 operational flights over Europe and was shot down by flak over Turin during a heavy attack on that city. He was put in a camp outside Rome, where he said the conditions could have been very much better. Later he was transferred to another camp outside Trieste, near the Yugoslav border. He was later in Stalag 18A, in Austria, and 4B, at Muckleburg, before being liberated by the Russians in April. Solway escaped from the Russians and rode in a truck with an intelligence officer to Paris, whence he was flown to England.

A bullet in the thigh during a raid on Dortmund put Warrant Officer Doug Keevers, of Bailey Street, Adamstown, in a German hospital for some time. Keevers joined the RAAF in May, 1942, and went into Wellington bombers as an observer. Keevers participated in one march lasting three and a half weeks in the middle of winter. He was eventually liberated by the American Second Army.

Warrant Officer Doug Randall, of Queen's Road, New Lambton, returned after more than three years away from Australia. He was attached to a heavy bomber and spent time in various prison camps after being shot down on a night mission.

Warrant Officer Neville McAlary, of Henry Street, Tighe's Hill, who joined the RAAF in October, 1940, was in two prison camps (in Italy and in Germany) after being shot down in a Wellington. Most of the repatriates complained that they had been through two victory days, but had not had a chance to celebrate. The first was in prison camps in Germany under Russian control and the second, when Japan capitulated, was celebrated in the mid-Atlantic on a "dry" ship.

September 11: The surrender of Dutch Timor was signed at noon on the quarter deck of HMAS Moresby, in Koepang Harbour. The surrender was signed by the Japanese commander, Colonel Kaida Tatsuicha, and by Brigadier Dyke on behalf of Australia. The Australian and Dutch convoy entered the harbour under the screen of Australian Liberators. A dilapidated Japanese barge brought the Japanese party aboard. The signing occurred in a tense air within 400 yards of battered Koepang.

In a ceremony that took less than 10 minutes, Rear-Admiral Sata, commander of Japanese Navy and Army forces on Kairiru and Muschu Islands off Wewak, surrendered his forces to Major-General Robertson, commander of the Australian Sixth Division. The signing took place aboard an Australian Navy motor launch in Kairiru Strait. General Robertson's orders for the separate surrender of the enemy forces on Kairiru and Muschu were issued after procrastination by Lieut-General Adachi, overall Japanese commander in New Guinea. Adachi will now surrender troops of his 18th Army to Major-General Robertson at Wewak on Thursday.