KOBE, Japan, Dec. 12 (Xinhua) — “The Nanjing Massacre is an eternal scar for the Chinese people. We overseas Chinese hope our Japanese friends and people around the world can really know about the tragedy,” Lin Boyao, the protagonist of a documentary just lately previewed in Japan’s Kobe stated on the screening.
The documentary, which focuses on Lin, an abroad Chinese in Japan, chronicled his life and efforts to collect proof of the Nanjing Massacre and his pursuit of compensation for Chinese compelled laborers throughout World War II.
Organized by the Kobe-Nanjing Heart-to-Heart Association, the preview screening passed off on Tuesday on the Kobe Student Youth Center.
Although the documentary remains to be a piece in progress, the organizers expedited the screening forward of China’s nationwide memorial day on Dec. 13, offering a possibility for viewers to have interaction with Lin’s story and mirror on the historic tragedies.
“Nanjing Massacre is a lesson for humanity; such a catastrophe must never happen again,” Lin emphasised throughout his deal with on the screening.
His phrases echoed the emotions of many within the viewers. Yoko Miyauchi, a consultant of the Kobe-Nanjing Heart-to-Heart Association, shared her insights into the group’s longstanding dedication to uncovering the truths of the Nanjing Massacre.
Established in 1997, the affiliation has devoted itself to preserving historic reminiscence, organizing over 20 journeys to Nanjing for commemorative occasions and internet hosting survivors of the bloodbath for testimony classes in Japan.
She additionally talked about that members of the affiliation would journey to Nanjing to take part on this 12 months’s nationwide memorial ceremony.
The screening additionally highlighted considerations over historic revisionism in Japan, with some attendees expressing apprehension concerning the diminishing protection of wartime atrocities in Japanese academic supplies.
A neighborhood educator, Naoko Katsube, shared her reflections on the occasion. She recalled that 15 to 16 years in the past, her college curriculum included excerpts from Terror in Minnie Vautrin’s Nanjing: Diaries and Correspondence, 1937-38, a helpful historic report primarily based on an eyewitness account of the bloodbath.
However, these supplies are not taught, reflecting the Japanese training system’s avoidance of historic truths, a development that deeply troubles her.
In an interview, Lin expressed concern concerning the lack of information amongst many Japanese individuals concerning the Nanjing Massacre. “Despite efforts to spread the truth, many remain uninformed. We hope to pass this historical memory down through generations to prevent such tragedies from recurring.”
“To remember history, cherish peace, use the past as a guide, and build a better future — this is the attitude we should adopt toward history,” remarked Zhu Chengshan, former curator of the Memorial Hall of the Victims in Nanjing Massacre.