Tokyo, Feb. 11.
Three hundred thousand Japanese, including 150,000 political offenders, have been reinstated to full citizenship by an Imperial Amnesty issued to-day on the occasion Empire Day which marks the 2,508th anniversary of the Accession of Emperor Jimmu, Japan's first Ruler, and the 50th anniversary of the promulgation of the Constitution.
Death sentences have been commuted to life sentences, while life sentences have been commuted to imprisonment or penal servitude for twenty years. Those already serving time have had their terms commuted to half the original Sentences.
The former Capt. Ittaro Yamaguchi and six other leaders of the revolt in Tokyo on February 26, 1986, have had their life sentences commuted to twenty years' imprisonment, while the former Naval Sub-Lieutenant Kiyoshi Koga and three other naval officers, who were involved in the assassination of the then Premier, Baron Inukai and other crimes in the terroust demonstration on May 15, 1932, have had the remainder of their sentences commuted by one quarter.
An Army order announces the cancellation, from to-day, of "an Army order of punishment: issued connection with offences committed previous to February 11 in favour of those who have already been punished or who are still under punishment, or whose punishment as been exempted, postponed, pended or otherwise not executed.
This order, it is believed, includes soldiers punished for of discipline in China Japanese octupled areas on the Yangtze Delta are still closed to former foreign residents, including missionaries, Japanese spokesmen announced last night. With the exception of medical missionaries connected with hospitals in Wuhu and Huchow, no permits to return to the various inland cities were being granted, they said.
"The presence of Chinese stragglers and the absence of adequate communications make the return of foreigners to such areas impractical, to say the least," a military spokesman seid.
"Whatever advantage may be gained fom the return of such persons would be nullified should any trouble arise," he added. Asked to explain what he meant by trouble, the spokesman said it concerned the possibilities of kidnapping or the harming of such foreigners by Chinese stragglers.
Regarding the suggestion that missionaries could waive the responsibility of the Japanese authorities for their safety by presenting documents to that effect, an Embassy spokesman said that such waivers would be legally useless.
"The American, British or any other Government would not consider its duty to protect its nationals to have been ended by the filing of such a waiver by individuals with the Japanese authority he said The counter-signing of such a waiver by foreign officials so as to give it legal validity was termed "inconceivable" by the spokesman.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.