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China handed over the remains of US pilots, who were listed as missing-in-action during World War II, to representatives from the United States at a ceremony held in Lhasa, capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region, on Friday.
The remains, in 112 pieces, were believed to be those of some US pilots who were transporting goods to southwest China through the well-known "Hump" aerial route during the war.
The remains were discovered in Mainling County of Tibet. According to official files, in 1945, a C-44 transport plane carrying four American crewmen, aged from 18 to 22, lost contact with ground control.
The remains will be taken back to the United States, and examinations will be conducted to determine whether the remains of all four missing crew members have been found.
Remains of US pilots have been discovered several times in Tibet, in 1983, 1991 and 1994, respectively. All of the discoveries were reported by local villagers.
In 1999, two local hunters discovered the remains of a US warplane in the county. In May 2000, another wreck of a US warplane was found in the same county.
In August this year, a joint Sino-US team arrived in the county to search forest areas for the remains from an altitude of 5,200 meters. It took one month for them to find the remains, but they did not search the other plane due to time restrictions.
In recent years, "Hump" warplanes have also been found in Yunnan Province and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.
The "Hump" route, which linked the Indian state of Assam, in the south, and the Chinese province of Sichuan, in the north, was established in 1942 and closed in 1945.
The US Air Force lost 468 planes and 1,579 pilots and crew members along the 500 kilometer-long aerial channel due to the harsh climatic and geological conditions in the area.
A total of 650,000 tons of war goods were transported via the "Hump" route, which contributed greatly to China's war of resistance against the Japanese invasion (1937-45). The war is part of World War II.
(Xinhua News Agency September 28, 2002)
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