Nanjing Massacre museum to be renovated for first memorial day

NANJING - China's Nanjing Massacre museum will be temporarily closed for maintenance and renovation, the museum announced Saturday.

The Memorial Hall of the Victims in Nanjing Massacre by Japanese Invaders, based in Nanjing, capital of east China's Jiangsu Province, will not receive visitors from Nov. 18 to Dec. 13.

This will be the second longest closure for the museum since it was opened to public in August, 1985, the 40th anniversary of World War II victory.

The museum was expanded in 2005 and reopened two years later. It has received more than 40 million visitors from at home and overseas since 1985.

Japanese invaders captured Nanjing, then China's capital, and started 40-odd days of slaughter from December 13, 1937. More than 300,000 soldiers without arm and civilians were murdered.

Starting from 1994, Jiangsu Province and Nanjing City have given memorial assemblies on Dec. 13 every year to mourn the victims and promote peace.

The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, has set two national memorial days, July 7 and Dec. 13, early this year to mark victory in the anti-Japanese invasion war and mourn Nanjing Massacre victims.

Japan invaded northeast China in September 1931. Historians agree that Japan's full-scale invasion started on July 7, 1937, when a crucial access point to Beijing, Lugou Bridge, was attacked by Japanese troops.

Around 35 million Chinese soldiers and civilians were killed or injured by Japanese invaders during the war against Japanese aggression (1937-1945).