New film ensures slain Japanese doctor’s Afghan legacy lives on

An independent English-language documentary on the extraordinary life and violent death of Tetsu Nakamura, a Japanese doctor who worked for years to turn a desert in war-torn Afghanistan green, is set to introduce him to a new audience while honoring his humanitarian feats.

Moved by Nakamura’s work, film director Kenji Yatsu filmed 1,000 hours of footage over 21 years starting in 1998, including Nakamura’s involvement in the digging of a canal while the Afghan war raged. He filmed until the months before the 73-year-old doctor was gunned down, along with five others by still-unidentified armed men, in Jalalabad on Dec. 4, 2019.

“I think Nakamura’s way of life would encourage people living in a world of uncertainties,” such as the Ukraine-Russia war and the recent Israel-Hamas conflict, says Yatsu, 62. “At a time when many people are distressed by deadly conflicts, I always believed that what Nakamura has left us has the power to once again spark the sincerity and (sense of) common good in humanity.”