China plans to repair and expand the Pingdingshan Massacre Memorial Hall in Fushun, a city in northeast China's Liaoning Province, at a cost of 30 million yuan (US$3.62 million) this year.

The renovation and expansion project, the largest of this kind since the memorial hall opened to the public 33 years ago, is scheduled to be completed in August 2006.

The Pingdingshan Massacre Memorial Hall was first built in 1972 in commemoration of some 3,000 innocent Chinese who were slaughtered by intruding Japanese soldiers on Sep. 16, 1932.

Covering 115,000 square meters, the memorial hall consists of a monument to those killed in the massacre and a museum built at the exact site of the massacre.

A hall in the museum houses the remains of more than 800 people who were killed in the massacre.

The renovation includes an expansion project for the hall housing the remains of those killed in the massacre, renovation of an exhibition hall for relics concerning the massacre and improvement of nearby environment, said Xiao Jingquan, curator of the hall.

"Apart from numerous domestic visitors, the Pingdingshan Massacre Memorial Hall attracts more than 3,000 Japanese visitors a year," Xiao said.

(Xinhua News Agency June 29, 2005)