Memorial and educational activities were held across China on Saturday to remember the victims of the Nanjing Massacre in Japan’s aggression against China in 1937.
This Saturday marks the 12th National Memorial Day for the Nanjing Massacre victims, which was formally established on Feb 27, 2014, by the Standing Committee of the 12th National People's Congress, designating Dec 13 as an annual day of remembrance through legislative procedure.
The Nanjing Massacre occurred after Japanese forces captured Nanjing, then the Chinese capital, on Dec 13, 1937, initiating six weeks of slaughter that claimed the lives of more than 300,000 Chinese civilians and unarmed soldiers.
At Huainan Datong Mass Grave Education Hall in east China's Anhui Province, over 200 representatives, from various sectors, each pinning a white flower, attended a memorial ceremony commemorating the National Memorial Day for Nanjing Massacre Victims. As a siren started to blare, all present stood still and observed a moment of silence.
Educational activities for younger generations were also held, with students learning about revolutionary history.
In Jinan, east China's Shandong Province, students from the Second Primary School of Hongjialou watched a documentary on the Nanjing Massacre and read letters that were written to families left by heroes in the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression out loud together.
"Through reading family letters, I felt the fearless spirit of our predecessors who resisted Japanese aggression, their willingness to sacrifice themselves for others, and their selfless patriotism," said Wu Ruichen, a student of the school.
China commemorates Nanjing Massacre victims with nationwide memorial activities
China's expanding ties with the Global South have pushed trade growth far beyond the global average despite the tariff pressure from the U.S., according to experts.
"Whilst the Trump tariffs ultimately led to a significant drop-off in Chinese exports to the United States and vice versa, the trading relationships across much of the rest of the world continue to grow, and China's trading relationships across the Belt and Road Initiative countries, as well as with the Global South, more broadly speaking, has grown at rates far greater than global trade growth as a whole. And we see that evidenced by the latest data. When we break that down, we see that has been underpinned by the developments in high-technology products in particular, whether it's EVs, whether it's even in semiconductors, as well as photovoltaic panels, etc.," said Dr. Warwick Powell, an adjunct professor at the Queensland University of Technology, in a TV interview with China Global Television Network (CGTN) on Thursday.
"And you've got to look at the places where the growth is taking place. Africa, I think, is a very interesting case in point, because the kinds of things that China has been exporting and expanding in terms of its exports are all about African economic development -- its machinery, its energy systems, its technology, and this really goes to delivering on China's broader strategic ambition as an emerging great power to be an enabling great power, supporting the development of its partners around the world," he added.
Qian Jun, executive dean of International School of Finance at Fudan University, attributed the trade growth to Chinese firms' endeavor to tap into key regions like ASEAN, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa.
"The main increase of export comes from, as we have discussed, these new areas: The ASEAN economy -- southeast Asia remains the most important trading partner -- and also Latin America, the Middle East, and these [other such] new regions. So, the exporters of the Chinese companies are also very good at adjusting their destinies, their strategies, how to market their goods and services, so that the reliance on the U.S., for example, has gone down a lot," Qian said.
China's trade momentum increasingly powered by Global South: experts
