China rejects potential Japanese protest at monument to Korean independence fighters

China on Monday dismissed a potential protest by Japan over a stone monument honoring Korean soldiers who fought for their peninsula's liberation from Japan's 1910-45 colonial rule, saying such a monument would help remind people of Japan's wartime past.

Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying also confirmed that the Chinese authorities have completed setting up the monument in the ancient city of Xian, where the Korean independence fighters were based, and will unveil it to the public "in the near future."

Two diplomatic sources in Xian told Yonhap News Agency on Sunday that China is set to unveil the monument later this month after months of construction, in another slap in the face to Japan.

China earlier this year had dedicated a memorial to a prominent Korean independence hero, Ahn Jung-geun, who assassinated the Korean Peninsula's first Japanese governor-general, Hirobumi Ito, in its northeastern city of Harbin in October 1909. Japan had reacted angrily to the Ahn memorial, calling him a terrorist.

"During the anti-Japan war, there were quite a number of Korean soldiers who came to China and fought with Chinese soldiers against Japanese militarists," Hua said of anti-Japanese battles by Korean and Chinese forces before the end of World War II.

"To my knowledge, construction of this monument has been completed and will be open to the public in the near future," Hua told reporters during a regular press briefing.

Asked about a possible protest by Japan against the monument, Hua replied, "As to problems it may bring, I believe that we should view this as normal. Because I believe that everyone should remember history so as to take a better attitude to face up to the future."

South Korean President Park Geun-hye requested China to build the Ahn memorial and the stone monument during her meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing in June last year. Reports at that time said Xi had accepted Park's request.

As far as their shared history is concerned, South Korea and China have much in common. Both suffered under Japan's imperialistic aggression in the early part of the 20th century that included World War II.

The monument will have inscriptions in both Korean and Chinese confirming that the site was the main base of the Korean Liberation Army and reaffirming friendship between the two countries, the sources said.

According to the sources, the monument is set up along with a three-meter-high pavilion at the Duquzhen of Changan district in Xian, where the Korean independence fighters were stationed in 1942.

A diplomat at the South Korean Embassy in Beijing who spoke on condition of anonymity said Seoul and Beijing have decided to hold an opening ceremony on May 29 to unveil the monument.

"The opening ceremony will be attended by officials from the two nations," the diplomat said.

China has recently been in lockstep with South Korea in its policy toward Japan. Both have been vocal against Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's visit and tribute to a controversial shrine in Tokyo that honors 14 Class A war criminals.

Tokyo's relations with its neighbors, especially with Beijing and Seoul, have plunged to one of their lowest points in many years over their shared history and territorial disputes. (Yonhap)