Eighty years after the Nanjing Massacre, one of the darkest moments in human history, China again showed the world its commitment to protecting peace by remembering wartime history to avoid repeated atrocities.[Special coverage]
With doves flying overhead and sirens wailing, a high-profile memorial service attended by President Xi Jinping was held Wednesday in Nanjing to observe the 80th anniversary of the 1937 massacre.
Japanese troops killed about 300,000 civilians and unarmed Chinese soldiers in the 40-odd-day slaughter.
People around the world have been doing their part to bring the massacre from the history of a city, and a country, into the memory of humanity.
An article, titled "Saving Nanjing from the forces of forgetting" and carried by the website of the Boston Globe Saturday, described the massacre as "one of last century's greatest crimes."
In October, the Ontario provincial parliament in Canada passed a motion designating Dec. 13 as Nanjing Massacre Commemorative Day to commemorate the mass killing.
UNESCO included Nanjing Massacre documents in its Memory of the World Register in 2015, making it a crucial and indelible piece of human history.
The massacre has already become a collective memory of all righteous forces in the world.
What Japan has done so far toward the tragedy, however, has been disappointing many.
Despite irrefutable evidence and facts, some right-wing Japanese politicians have repeatedly denied the massacre.
The Nanjing Massacre, like many other infamous war atrocities by Japanese invaders, is now merely an "incident" in Japanese textbooks.
When UNESCO included the massacre documents in its Memory of the World Register, some Japanese politicians threatened to halt or cut funding for the UN body.
In addition, the Japanese government has been trying to revise its pacifist Constitution.
Denial of the Nanjing Massacre will not be allowed by the Chinese people or peace-loving people anywhere. It will only alert people to the risks to peace that such denial could bring about.
Chinese people remember the past. War is a mirror, which makes people better understand the preciousness of peace.
China champions the development of a community with a shared future for mankind. The country is firm in pursuing peaceful development, and being a contributor to world peace and development.
However, it is worth noting that only if everyone cherishes and safeguards peace, and only if everyone remembers the bitter lessons of war, can there be hope for peace.
