The Chinese yuan has emerged as the fourth most active currency for global payments, the country's central bank said on Tuesday.
Thanks to various measures taken by the central bank to facilitate cross-border use of Chinese yuan, cross-border yuan payments totaled about 64 trillion yuan (about 8.73 trillion U.S. dollars) in 2024, an increase of 23 percent year on year, Xuan Changneng, deputy governor of the People's Bank of China, told a press conference.
Various indicators of the international use of Chinese yuan have steadily improved, with the ability of cross-border yuan business to serve the real economy continuously enhanced, showed data from the central bank.
Over 80 overseas central banks and monetary authorities have included Chinese yuan in their foreign exchange reserves.
The balance of Hong Kong's offshore Chinese yuan deposits exceeded one trillion yuan, while the offshore Chinese yuan loan balance approached 700 billion yuan, both at historically high levels.
The PBOC will continue strengthening Chinese yuan's coordination with foreign currencies and facilitating yuan-based cross-border financing to create a favorable environment for domestic and foreign entities to hold and use the Chinese currency.
"We will support Shanghai in its efforts to build a global Chinese yuan financial asset allocation center and risk management center, and support yuan-based trade, financing, overseas loans, and the issuance of Chinese yuan bonds. We will improve the supply mechanism of offshore Chinese yuan liquidity, support the sound development of the offshore Chinese yuan market, and consolidate and enhance Hong Kong's status as an international financial center and offshore Chinese yuan business hub. We will improve the infrastructure facilities for cross-border use of Chinese yuan, rationally set up new Chinese yuan clearing banks, and continuously enhance the functions and services of the Chinese yuan cross-border payment system," Xuan said.
China's yuan rises to fourth most active currency in global transactions
A video featuring a former member of Unit 731, a notorious Japanese germ-warfare unit during World War II (WWII), was released on Thursday in northeast China's Harbin, revealing details of how the unit used meteorological data to conduct horrific bacterial experiments on human beings.
The video was released by the Exhibition Hall of Evidence of Crimes Committed by Unit 731 of the Japanese Imperial Army, in which former Unit 731 member Tsuruo Nishijima detailed how the unit used meteorological data to carry out a bacterial dispersal experiment.
The video was recorded in 1997 by Japanese scholar Fuyuko Nishisato and donated to the exhibition hall in 2019, according to the hall, which was built on the former site of the headquarters of Unit 731 in Harbin, the capital city of Heilongjiang Province.
Jin Shicheng, director of the Department of Publicity, Education and Exhibition of the exhibition hall, said that Nishijima joined Unit 731 in October 1938 and served in the unit's meteorological squad. The squad was not a simple observation section but rather an auxiliary force supporting the unit's field human experiments by measuring wind direction, wind speed, and other conditions to ensure optimal experimental results, according to Jin.
Nishijima confirmed in the footage that "the meteorological squad had to be present at every field experiment." He testified to the "rainfall experiments" conducted by Unit 731, which involved aircraft releasing bacterial agents at extremely low altitudes.
At a field-testing site in Anda City, Heilongjiang, Unit 731 aircraft descended to about 50 meters above the ground. They sprayed bacterial culture liquids onto "maruta" -- human test subjects -- who were tied to wooden stakes. Each experiment involved about 30 people, spaced roughly 5 meters apart. After the experiments, the victims were loaded into sealed trucks and transported back to the unit, where their symptoms and disease progression were recorded over a period of several days.
"Unit 731's bacterial weapons were dropped by aircraft from a height of 50 meters in the open air. Therefore, the meteorological squad needed to observe wind direction and speed, which directly affected the precision and accuracy of the bacterial weapons deployment," said Jin.
Nishijima recounted the harrowing experience of the human test subjects.
"They were fully aware that inhaling the substances would certainly lead to death, so they closed their eyes and held their breath to avoid breathing them in. Their resistance prevented the experiment from proceeding. To compel them to comply, they were forced at gunpoint to open their mouths and lift their heads," said Nishijima.
These experiments, disguised as "scientific research," were in fact systematic tests of biological warfare weapons conducted by the Japanese military. The data generated from these inhumane activities became "research findings" shared among the Japanese army medical school, the medical community, and the military at large.
"At that time, the entire Japanese medical community tacitly approved, encouraged, and even participated in the criminal acts of Unit 731. The unit comprised members from Japan's medical and academic sectors who served the Japanese war of aggression against China. Thus, Unit 731 was not just a military unit but represented an organized and systematic criminal enterprise operating from the top down," said Jin.
Unit 731 was a top-secret biological and chemical warfare research base established in Harbin as the nerve center for Japanese biological warfare in China and Southeast Asia during WWII.
At least 3,000 people were used for human experiments by Unit 731, and Japan's biological weapons killed more than 300,000 people in China.
Video offers details of Japan's germ-warfare crimes in northeast China
