Chinese city remembers 'The Rape of Nanking' author Iris Chang

The city of Nanjing on Friday marked 14 years of the death of Iris Chang, whose book "The Rape of Nanking" trained the global spotlight on the 1937 Nanjing Massacre by Japanese invaders.

Members of the public observed a ritual of silence, bowed and laid flowers in front of a bronze statue of Chang at the Memorial Hall of the Victims in Nanjing Massacre by Japanese Invaders.

The Chinese-American historian and writer, who died in 2004, is credited for collecting and presenting a profusion of accounts and archives in her book that helped expose the brutality committed by Japanese troops in the ancient city of Nanjing.

The massacre took place when Japanese troops captured the eastern Chinese city on Dec. 13, 1937. In six weeks, they killed 300,000 Chinese civilians, unarmed soldiers and raped more than 20,000 women.

Wang Weixing, a researcher with the Jiangsu Provincial Academy of Social Sciences, recalled the time when Chang, then 27 years old, arrived in Nanjing in 1995 in search of massacre survivors.

"She brought a map of Nanjing in the 1930s and pinned it on the wall. Every day after interviewing survivors, she would label on it the mass killing sites and escape routes they mentioned and then compared with historical records and archives," said Wang, who described Chang as a meticulous young scholar.

Zhang Jianjun, curator of the memorial hall, said Chang's efforts to study and tell the truth of history will be forever remembered.

"She inspired us that it is a duty to tell the world what actually happened, and it requires much courage to fight those who intentionally forget or ignobly deny history," said Zhang.