A former Army intelligence officer has returned to Burma where his work helped to prosecute scores of Japanese war criminals after the Second World War.

Ron Wolfenden had spent two years in Burma - now called Myanmar - gathering intelligence, working on security and anti-subversion and interrogating spies before his unit began investigating war crimes.

"We were operating among the local population and a lot of them had been witness to the treatment the Japanese had meted out on our soldiers who were taken prisoner," said The 85-year-old retired managing director, who lives in Birkenshaw.

"If the evidence was confirmed they would go for trial in Rangoon."

He and his group travelled extensively up and down the Irrawaddy - the nation's great river, so wide in parts that the far bank appeared as little more than a horizon.

From their fleet of boats they could reach most of the towns and villages. They recorded the experiences and suffering of the local people and built up a detailed and damning indictment of the Japanese army.

A number of Japanese defendants were sentenced to death. "Some stories we heard were pretty horrible," said Mr Wolfenden, who joined the British Army in 1940 and spent more than three years in India and Sri Lanka before Burma.

"When I went to join the new section of the Intelligence Corps in Bassein in western Burma, I was told the previous regimental sergeant there had blown his brains out because of the anxiety and worry of his duties, and that the commanding officer was on the verge of a nervous break down," he said.

Despite the horrific evidence, Mr Wolfenden managed to complete his work, which will have given comfort to thousands of British servicemen and their families.

"I think if you are young you tend to cope with it a bit better," he said. "I had a job to do."

Mr Wolfenden's first return trip to Myanmar has been made possible by a grant from the Heroes Return Fund - a Government scheme to allow ex-servicemen and women to revisit the places where they served during wartime.

"I think it will be very emotional," he said. "But I think it will be nice to go back to see the places where I was and see how they have changed.

"When we were there, it was mostly jungle, sand and not much else. Now it is under the control of a military government but I have been told I may be surprised and that it's more developed than one would imagine."

Mr Wolfenden, who is a former director and vice-chairman of Halifax Rugby League Club and is now president of Methley Cricket Club, left for Burma yesterday with his 49-year-old son Richard.

They were to visit Rangoon and the historic capital of Pagan before travelling up the Irrawaddy to Mandalay.