On a remote coral island in the tiny Pacific nation of Palau , officials have been inching through foliage littered with explosives to open up a network of sealed caves and search for thousands of bodies believed to have lain inside since the Second World War . 
 
 The grim and painstaking task, undertaken by a team of local and Japanese archaeologists and munitions experts, is aimed at finding the remains of Japanese soldiers trapped inside by United States forces during one of the toughest battles of the war. 
 
 The Japanese used the caves, connected via tunnels and narrow passageways, as a base for their defence of Peleliu, a narrow island only six miles long. More than 10,000 Japanese soldiers died, but the bodies of 2,600 were never found. 
 
 Now, Palau has agreed to open about 200 remaining sealed caves to try to locate the remains ahead of a visit early next month by Japan's Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko. 
 
 The macabre task is risky and involves clearing a way into the caves through thick forest littered with unexploded ordnance. 
 
 A team of experts took five days last week to clear their way into just one small cave with a 7ft opening. 
 
 Archaeologists found a set of bones which are believed to be human and will be taken back to Japan for testing. 
 
 "They found some bones while they were clearing the entrance of the cave," Bernadette Carreon, a local journalist, told ABC Radio. "They did not use heavy equipment because they have to make it clear of heavy ordnance. When it's clear, the archaeologists can go in and start bone collection." 
 
 
 
 Marines smoke cigarettes, but keep their weapons close in a blasted landscape of Peleliu Island, Palau during WWII 
 
 The attempt to find the bodies has been welcomed in Japan and is part of an effort to end a brutal chapter from the war, in which US marines were pitted against Japanese troops who had set up their defences in the intricate labyrinth of heavily fortified caves and underground bunkers. It is still regarded as one of the harshest conflicts in the history of the marines. 
 
 Unlike previous battles in the Pacific, the Japanese did not focus their defence on using suicide charges to prevent the Americans from establishing a beachhead. 
 
 Instead, the Japanese forces largely allowed the marines to land but staged their defence from inside the caves. 
 
 The Japanese, who had occupied Palau for about 30 years, had spent decades using dynamite and axes to enlarge existing caves on Peleliu and blast out new ones. The caves and their entrances were then heavily camouflaged. 
 
 • Japan receives biggest warship since Second World War 
 
 • Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen: 'I've found wreck of long-lost WWII Japanese battleship' 
 
 The US forces expected the battle in September 1944 to last only four or five days. "It will be a hard-fought quickie," predicted William Rupertus, the US marine commander. It took more than 10 weeks. 
 
 More than 1,600 US soldiers were killed during the battle, which ended with the marines blowing up many of the caves, leaving thousands of the enemy trapped inside. Shortly before the Americans finally seized the small island in late November, Col Kunio Nakagawa, the Japanese commander, atoned for his defeat by committing ritual suicide in his post. 
 
 About 35 Japanese soldiers remained hiding in the caves until April 1947, more than 18 months after the war officially ended. They were the last troops to surrender. 
 
 Keiji Nagai, 93, and Kiyokazu Tsuchida, 95, two of the 35 soldiers who surrendered in 1947, met the Japanese emperor and empress earlier this month to provide an account of the hand-to-hand combat they experienced during the battle. The empress quietly told Mr Nagai: "You went through a lot." 
 
 Authorities began collecting the remains at various locations around the island in 1953, but Japanese authorities say 2,600 soldiers have yet to be found. The bodies are believed to be holed up inside about 200 caves which were deemed dangerous and left sealed to prevent public access. About 450 Japanese soldiers survived the battle and later helped to direct the authorities to the site of graves. 
 
 
 
 The island of Peleliu (Alamy) 
 
 The entire island has become something of a monument to the battle, with unexploded bombs a constant threat to residents and tourists. Following the war, Japan created a peace park which included a Shinto shrine with the inscription "To all countries' unknown soldiers". 
 
 Officials in Palau have worked closely with Japan to try to recover the remaining bodies and return them to the families of the soldiers. Some representatives of the families of the Japanese soldiers have assisted with the search. 
 
 Sachio Kageyama, from a group representing families and fellow soldiers of those who fought on the island, told The Japan Times: "I hope the forthcoming visit by the emperor will pave the way for [further] collection of remains." 
 
 Palau, a remote cluster of islands east of the Philippines with a population of about 21,000, was the scene of heavy fighting during the war. The fierce battle at Peleliu was over an airfield now deemed of questionable strategic value by most historians. 
 
 The search for the bodies has also focused on a long-lost mass grave on the western side of the island, close to where the current cave search is being conducted. 
 
 US military documents indicating the cemetery's location were found two years ago at a naval museum in California. The documents included a map created in January 1945 which says "Japanese cemetery" and points to the centre of the island. A separate report from a construction battalion says that logs were placed on the site to prevent people disturbing the graves. US officials reportedly told Palau in 1994 that a mass grave was located near Nakagawa's grave. 
 
 US experts have also been searching Palau's coral reefs, lagoons and islands for planes that were lost in the conflict. Last year, underwater robots were used to find two warplanes on the ocean floor. ||||| Bodies believed to be of Japanese WWII soldiers discovered in Palau cave sealed off for 70 years 
 
 Updated 
 
 The bodies of six soldiers, believed to be Japanese troops who fought in World War II, have been discovered in a reopened cave in the tiny Pacific nation of Palau. 
 
 The site — one of around 200 sealed caves on the island of Pelileu — was recently opened again for the first time in nearly 70 years. 
 
 The caves were used when US and Japanese forces fought a fierce battle on the island's beaches in September 1944. 
 
 Steve Ballinger, operations director with non-government organisation Cleared Ground Demining, said the bodies of the six soldiers would be repatriated. 
 
 "The cave itself is in an area known as the promontory which is the defining point on the west coast of the island of Pelileu," he told Radio Australia's Pacific Beat program. 
 
 "At that location was an anti-tank gun in a heavily fortified concrete bunker and it took a number of days actually to capture this fortified position. 
 
 "It's my understanding that those [bodies] were the crew, perhaps the officer and his men that were manning that gun ... a number of US soldiers died in that vicinity as well." 
 
 Mr Ballinger said other war relics were also found in and around the cave. 
 
 "During the detection and investigation we located hand grenades, large projectiles, small arms ammunition and (an) array of explosive remnants of war," he said. 
 
 The decision to open the caves in Palau comes ahead of an imperial visit next week by Japanese emperor Akihito and empress Michiko. 
 
 The team tasked with making the caves safe for anthropologists to investigate has been operating in Palau to clear remnants of WWII ordnance for six years. 
 
 It is made up of 18 Palauans, two Britons and one person each from South Africa and Australia. 
 
 Mr Ballinger said the team had been concerned about possible booby traps when they first entered the cave. 
 
 "[We] had to check in the floor and the entrance of the cave to allow Japanese and US anthropologists and archaeologists in there," he said. 
 
 "It was very tight, it was a very difficult entrance to the cave, a very harsh environment to work in." 
 
 He said the cave the remains were found has since been resealed. 
 
 "A lot of field caves will contain considerable quantities of human remains and as such you could designate them as graves and wouldn't be appropriate to use as tourist attractions," he said. 
 
 An estimated 10,000 Japanese soldiers died during the fighting in the country, and the remains of some 2,600 troops have never been found. 
 
 Topics: world-war-2, history, unrest-conflict-and-war, archaeology, palau, pacific, japan, united-states 
 
 First posted
– The island nation of Palau is preparing for a visit from Japan's Emperor Akihito next week with an unusual and grim task: It's investigating long-sealed caves on the island of Peleliu to look for the remains of Japanese soldiers from World War II. The remains of six soldiers have been discovered so far, but that's just the start. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reports they were found in one of about 200 sealed caves on Peleliu. An estimated 10,000 Japanese men were killed in a weeks-long battle with US troops during the war, and the bodies of 2,600 of them were never found. The Japanese used a network of caves and tunnels during the 1944 fighting, recounts the Telegraph, and largely "staged their defense" from within the caves. About 1,600 American troops were killed, but the US military blew up many of the caves (essentially sealing the Japanese within) and eventually gained control. The six newly found bodies were found in the vicinity of an anti-tank gun, and "it's my understanding that those [bodies] were the crew, perhaps the officer and his men that were manning that gun," says one of the search officials. "A number of US soldiers died in that vicinity as well." The task is painstaking because searchers need to guard against booby traps or the detonation of old munitions. An interesting side note from the Telegraph: Some 35 Japanese soldiers who had been hiding in the caves surrendered in April 1947—more than a year after the war's end. (In other WWII news, Anne Frank likely died earlier than thought.)