TOKYO, Dec. 12 (Xinhua) -- "Only by facing up to real history can we think about where the future is headed" - Remembering the Nanjing Massacre 2021 Tokyo Testimony
Xinhua News Agency reporter Guo Dan
"Three or four thousand Chinese, armed behind, in groups of four, in four columns, were driven to the coal port north of Nanjing, and strafed them with two heavy machine guns." Sergeant Kenro Kajitani of the Second Berth Headquarters of the Japanese Army who participated in the Nanjing Massacre recorded the massacre in Nanjing on December 17, 1937, in his field diary.
December 13 this year marks the 84th anniversary of the death of the Nanjing Massacre and the eighth National Day of Commemoration for the Victims of the Nanjing Massacre.
On December 11, Nobuo Kono, a retired history teacher at the Tokyo Metropolitan Public High School, delivered a speech at the "Nanjing Massacre 84th Anniversary Testimony" held at the YMCA Asian Youth Center in Tokyo, Japan. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Zhang Xiaoyu
On the 11th, Lin Boyao, a long-term overseas Chinese living in Japan who has been engaged in historical research related to the Nanjing Massacre, took the map of the Coal Harbor Massacre drawn by Kenro Kajitani when he was alive and gave a speech at the "Testimony Meeting on the 84th Anniversary of the Nanjing Massacre" held at the YMCA Asian Youth Center in Tokyo, Japan.
In addition to Kenro Kajitani's diary, the testimony on the day also displayed the personal diaries of Nakajima Imago, commander of the 16th Division of the Japanese invasion of China, and Sasaki Kazuichi, commander of the 30th Brigade. One of them, Sasaki toichi wrote in his diary: "Before dawn we broke through the enemy positions, and then strafed the people gathered on the riverbank and the remnants of the defeated generals, and all 15,000 rounds of ammunition were fired"... The lines of cruel words also confirm the fact that the Japanese army carried out massacres in Nanjing.
On December 11, at the "84th Anniversary Testimony of the Nanjing Massacre" held at the YMCA Asian Youth Center in Tokyo, Japan, Lin Boyao, a long-term overseas Chinese living in Japan who has been engaged in historical research on the Nanjing Massacre, introduced the map of the Coal Harbor Massacre. The map was hand-drawn by Sergeant Kenro Kajitani, a Japanese sergeant who had participated in the Nanjing Massacre, during his lifetime. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Zhang Xiaoyu
At the testimony, a video of the memories of Chen Degui and Pan Kaiming, two survivors of the Nanjing Coal Harbor Massacre, was also played. In the narration of the two men, the number of people who were taken to the river at that time, the scene of the kidnapped people lining up, and the scene of the Japanese strafing are completely consistent with the contents of Kenro Kajitani's diary, and also echo the content of Sasaki's record. The descriptions of the same scene by people with different positions corroborate each other, indistinguishable, ironclad and irrefutable.
Hiroshi Tanaka, a representative of the organizer of the conference, "No More Nanjing Association", told reporters that the association was established in the hope that the Japanese people would not only know "No More Hiroshima", but also remember the Nanjing Massacre created by the Japanese. According to Hiroshi Tanaka, the association currently has branches in Ten locations, including Fukuoka, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Osaka, Nagoya, and Tokyo, and they will hold testimonials around December 13 in various parts of Japan. Before the epidemic, they would also invite witnesses or survivors from Nanjing to come to Japan to tell the story, and they would also go to Nanjing to shoot some documentary materials and broadcast them in Japan.
In the face of the overwhelming evidence of the Nanjing Massacre, some Japanese politicians today are still painstakingly trying to change the historical truth.
On December 11, Hiroshi Tanaka, a representative of the organizer of the conference, "No More Nanjing", delivered a speech at the "Nanjing Massacre 84th Anniversary Testimony" held at the YMCA Asian Youth Center in Tokyo, Japan. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Zhang Xiaoyu
At the testimony, Nobuo Kono, a retired history teacher at Tokyo Public High School, criticized the Japanese government's practice of "manipulating" teaching arrangements or teaching materials to obscure Japanese students' perception of real history. For example, the Nanjing Massacre was called the "Nanjing Incident", the War of Aggression against China was called the "Japan-China War" with equal responsibilities, the number of victims of the Nanjing Massacre was denied, the "Kono Talk" was deleted, and the historical truth was constantly obscured with some unclear expressions. Kono said: "The government has revised history in some small details every time, but the superposition of one modification after another will completely change the historical truth after a long time." ”
On that day, nearly 100 Japanese people attended the meeting. In the face of testimonies telling the true history, all those present listened with particular seriousness and seriousness. The presiding officer of the conference said: "Only by facing up to the real history can we truly come out of the tragic history and truly think about where the future is going." ”