Han Ximin

ximhan@126.com

MORE than 10,000 residents visited Shenzhen Revolutionary Martyrs Cemetery in Futian District on Sunday, Tomb-Sweeping Day, to pay tribute to the soldiers who sacrificed their lives for the nation.

A group of young employees with Shenzhen Company of China First Metallurgical Group Co. Ltd. presented wreaths to pay tribute.

One of them, Gong Jun, said the young generation should always remember the heroic and fearless spirit of the fallen soldiers in facing dangers and difficulties.

He Jing, a Bao’an District resident, logged onto http://tyjr.sz.gov.cn/zt/szylw/wsjd, the Shenzhen official website  dedicated to martyrs, to pay  tribute to He Guanjie.

He Guanjie, a native of Guanlan in Longhua, joined the Dongjiang Column of the Guangdong People’s Anti-Japanese Aggression Guerrilla Force in 1942 and gave his life at 23. Shenzhen was once the major battlefield of Dongjiang Column.

“I mourn for him each year with my children,” He Jing said.

Data from the Shenzhen Municipal Veterans Affairs Bureau showed, so far, 1,122 people have been registered as martyrs, including 34 with incomplete information.

The bureau said it will make every effort to complete the information of the 34 martyrs so that they will not be forgotten by history and be “reunited” with their descendants someday.

Founded in 1986, the 57,000-square-meter Shenzhen Revolutionary Martyrs Cemetery houses the tomb of Zeng Sheng, a Pingshan native of Shenzhen who joined the CPC in 1936 and served as commander of Dongjiang Column.

The Shenzhen Revolutionary Martyrs Memorial Hall in the cemetery exhibits materials, pictures and relics of martyrs from different periods in Shenzhen.

The names of 1,050 people who fought and gave their lives in Shenzhen since 1900 were inscribed on a pavilion at the southwest corner of the cemetery.

During the holiday, the city opened more than 50 public sites, including cemeteries, memorial halls and martyr statues, for the public to mourn at.

Nationally, people across the country paid tribute to nearly 2 million martyrs online Sunday.

An official website dedicated to martyrs launched an event for the annual festival so people could, via an online platform, pay tribute to those who gave their lives for the country.

The site has a searchable database listing the names of 2 million heroes that website visitors can choose to honor, sweep their virtual tombs and leave virtual flower baskets.

As of 10 p.m. Sunday, the website showed that more than 23 million people had mourned fallen heroes.

Speaking of the festival, President Xi Jinping has said that heroes always charge forward when a calamity occurs, and this embodies the great spirit of the Chinese nation.

The purpose of learning from the heroes, Xi said, is to apply their spirit in one’s everyday work and demonstrate a strong sense of responsibility toward people’s lives and safety.

(More on P8)