NANJING, China – China on Saturday warned against any moves to revive past militarism during an event marking the 88th anniversary of the 1937 massacre in Nanjing committed by Japanese troops, alluding to Beijing-Tokyo tensions that have simmered since Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s recent remarks on a Taiwan contingency.
At the memorial ceremony, Shi Taifeng, head of the ruling Communist Party’s organization department, said that any attempt to revive militarism and challenge the postwar international order is “doomed to fail,” without naming Takaichi.
With this year marking 80 years since Japan’s surrender in World War II, China has held various memorial events, including a military parade in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square on Sept. 3.
Participants of the service held at the Memorial Hall of the Victims in Nanjing Massacre by Japanese Invaders observed a minute of silence while sirens were heard across the Jiangsu Province city.
The Nanjing massacre was a “horrendous crime committed by Japanese militarists” that marked “the darkest page in human history,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said at a press conference on Friday.
“Japanese militarists’ war of aggression against China and other Asian countries under the pretext of a so-called survival-threatening situation and untold crimes against humanity are nothing but a disgrace in the history of human civilization,” Guo added.
Beijing has ramped up pressure on Tokyo since Takaichi said in parliament on Nov. 7 that a Taiwan emergency could be a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan that may lead to action from the country’s defense forces in support of the United States.
China regards the self-ruled island as part of its territory and insists that the Taiwan issue is purely an “internal affair.”
In 2014, China designated Dec. 13 as a national memorial day, with President Xi Jinping attending the annual ceremony that year and again in 2017 on the occasion of the 80th anniversary.
In 2022, Cai Qi, the No. 5 figure in the ruling Communist Party, became the first member of the top leadership to join the ceremony in five years.
China claims the Japanese army slaughtered over 300,000 people in the city, formerly called Nanking. In contrast, estimates by Japanese historians place the death toll of Chinese civilians and soldiers between the tens of thousands and 200,000.
This year, the film “Dead to Rights,” which depicts the Nanjing massacre, topped the summer box office in China after its release on July 25, adding to concerns about growing anti-Japanese sentiment in the country.
The Japanese Embassy in China has advised Japanese residents in the country to be vigilant on Saturday, the national memorial day of the Nanjing Massacre, urging them to refrain from speaking loudly in Japanese when in public.
BY: The Times Union
