China's Ministry of Ecology and Environment released its 2024 Report on the State of the Ecology and Environment in China at an Environment Day event in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality on Thursday.
The report reveals continuing progress in improving the country's environmental quality compared to 2023.
The average concentration of PM2.5 in cities at the prefecture level and above decreased by 2.7 percent year-on-year to 29.3 micrograms per cubic meter in 2024. The proportion of days with good air quality in these cities rose by 1.7 percentage points to 87.2 percent.
Water quality also improved, with the proportion of surface water sections meeting Grade I to III standards increasing by 1.0 percentage point to 90.4 percent.
The report also indicated that the quality of seawater in Chinese territorial waters was generally stable and soil environmental risks were under control, with heavy metal concentrations at key monitoring points showing a downward trend.
The overall condition of China's natural ecosystems remained stable, the report said, with forest coverage exceeding 25 percent, and the soil conservation rate at 72.83 percent after 64,000 square kilometers of erosion control areas were added.
Sound level quality in cities at the prefecture level and above remained stable, it said.
Officials at the event also announced that Guangdong Province and the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions will jointly host China's National Environment Day Event in 2026.
China observes its national Environment Day annually on June 5, coinciding with World Environment Day.
Report shows continuing progress in China's environmental quality
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
