War prisoner's quest for justice

By Cindi John BBC News community affairs reporter

Nine members of Diana Elias' family were put in an internment camp

Sitting in the living room of Diana Elias' comfy north London home, it is hard to imagine the horrors which she and her family lived through on the other side of the world more than half a century ago.

It was her family's experience during World War II which ultimately led the 81-year-old to bring a successful case against the British government who had refused her compensation because although British citizens, neither she nor her immediate family were born in the UK.

Prior to the Japanese entering World War II in 1941, her family lived a comfortable life in Hong Kong where her father ran a textile factory, Mrs Elias recalls.

It's not the money, it's the justice I wanted because the government betrayed me Diana Elias

Her ordeal began when she was 17 after the British colony surrendered to the Japanese in December 1941.

Mrs Elias' family, like all other British citizens who had not been evacuated from the island, were rounded up and taken to an internment camp.

"The Japanese came to arrest us in the middle of the night. All the women were dragged out of the house by their hair, they screamed and shouted at the men to hurry up and wouldn't even let them dress," she says.

'Filthy'

The family were taken to Stanley Camp on Hong Kong island which housed approximately 2,800 men, women and children, mainly British, until the end of the war in 1945.

Mrs Elias says conditions in the camp were appalling.

"There was one room for nine of us, it was filthy and we were fed only banana skins and boiled rice. When we were outside, if we didn't bow to the Japanese they would slap us."

Mrs Elias says her court action was not about the money

In spite of wanting to reclaim their home and possessions in Hong Kong, the rest of the family were forced to leave the island, Mrs Elias says.

They initially went to India where Diana married and settled, however, she made frequent trips to the UK to visit her sisters and brothers before settling in the UK herself in 1978.

"I worked for a travel agent and travelled between India and the UK where my sisters and brothers lived. I had no restrictions in my passport because I was a British citizen," she says.

'Racism'

With a full British passport she assumed she would be eligible for compensation when the government announced it in 2000 and says she was outraged to discover there was a "blood link" clause to the payment.

"Either you had to be born in the UK or your parents or grandparents. We had no proof of that but it was because we were British we were interned," she said.

Although all the family held British passports at the time of their interment, Diana Elias' mother and father had been born in India. All their children were born in either India or Hong Kong.

Mrs Elias says the decision to link payment to place of birth, not nationality, is discriminatory.

"It is definitely racism and discrimination - I was British all along. That is why the Japanese took us," she says.

"The British government did the same thing to me as the Japanese. They condoned what the Japanese did to me and I wanted justice before I died."

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