China publicizes videos documenting Rape of Nanjing

China's State Archives Administration (SAA) on Friday said it will release video archives documenting the Nanjing Massacre, days before a national memorial day to remember the event.

The seven-part video series will be released on the SAA's website, one per day. It will feature photos taken by invading Japanese troops at the time of the massacre - in which more than 300,000 people were killed - in addition to excerpts from letters by Japanese soldiers, news reports by both Japanese and Chinese journalists, and confessions of Japanese troops.

They also include movies, diary entries and testimonies by foreigners, diaries of Chinese citizens who witnessed the massacre, official records from the recovery and burial of dead bodies in Nanjing, investigation reports conducted by China on Japanese war crimes, and verdicts of Japanese war criminals.

The series will mark China's first National Memorial Day for Nanjing Massacre Victims on Dec. 13 to mourn the Nanjing Massacre victims and all of those killed by Japanese invaders.

According to SAA head Li Minghua, the release of the documents will provide "undeniable" evidence of the infamous Nanjing Massacre, or the Rape of Nanking, to remember the victims, and to reject the "shameless babbling" of some Japanese right-wing forces that have attempted to distort history.

Japan invaded northeast China in September 1931, though historians agree that Japan's full-scale invasion started on July 7, 1937. Around 35 million Chinese soldiers and civilians were killed or injured by Japanese invaders during the war against Japanese aggression (1937-1945).

The Nanjing Massacre happened over the course of more than 40 days in late 1937, shocking the world.