A CAMPAIGNING war veteran's attempt to meet the Emperor of Japan has been given the cold shoulder.

Former prisoner of war Arthur Titherington believed the get-together could have helped in the ongoing row over compensation for victims of Japanese PoW camps.

But the 76-year-old campaigner has now been told officially that Emperor Akihito will not be going out of his way to see him during his state visit to Britain later this month.

The rebuff follows several visits to Japan by Mr Titherington, of Church Green, Witney, for meetings with ambassadors and senior ministers and officials at the Foreign Office.

He said this week: "I am told that the Emperor had to be seen to be above politics. My answer is that this is a humanitarian issue. So much for the claim that the Emperor wants to meet the ordinary people while he is over here."

Mr Titherington, a former Witney mayor, is chairman of the Japanese Slave Labour Camp Association. He survived four years in PoW camps and is heading a claim for £13,000 compensation for each survivor and widows of survivors.

The issue was debated in the House of Commons last week when a cross-party group of MPs, led by Liberal democrat Mark Oaten, demanded compensation for the thousands of Allied troops who suffered in Far East labour camps during the Second World War.

Mr Titherington says the debate, which they watched from the public gallery, gave them a ray of hope. He said: "I didn't hear Mr Fatchett - foreign office minister - speak because I was fed up with all the hypocrisy so left the chamber, but I was told afterwards that he changed his tune slightly during the debate.

"Our solicitor, Martyn Day, said that there was a little chink of light because Mr Fatchett said he would think it over, so the matter's not finished yet."

The issue of compensation was included in the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty, which Mr Fatchett had said was closed and he would not ask the Japanese to re-open.

Veterans have vowed to disrupt the visit of Emperor Akihito to Britain, starting on May 26, by turning their back on him during a procession - a gross insult in Far East culture.

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