BEIJING, August 18 -- The memorial of the Nanjing Massacre began accepting donations for its expansion yesterday, said a proposal by the survivors and relatives of the victims from the holocaust 70 years ago.

    "The donation is actually a way to preserve patriotic education, encouraging all the pacifists and patriots to preserve history," Zhu Chengshan, the curator of the Memorial Hall of the Victims from the Nanjing Massacre, told Xinhua news agency.

    The expansion of the memorial, beginning on December 13, has the supports of many foreign pacifist groups, patriotic overseas Chinese and the compatriots from China's Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan.

    They have expressed their willingness to do something for the expanding construction of the memorial, said the report.

    Meanwhile, the survivors and relatives of the victims of the massacre said they would donate as a way to express their strong disapproval of Koizumi's visit to a shrine honoring war criminals on Tuesday, it said.

    Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visit fell on the anniversary of Tokyo's August 15, 1945, World War II surrender. The shrine, which honors Japan's war dead, including the class-A war criminals, glorifies Tokyo's militarism of the 1930s and 40s, when Japanese forces invaded much of East Asia at a cost of millions of lives.

    Any articles and information relating to the holocaust are welcome, including portraits of the victims and the belongings of the invaders, the proposal said.

    The Nanjing Massacre occurred in December 1937 when Japanese troops occupied what was then the capital of China and killed more than 300,000 people. More than 20,000 women were raped and one-third of the city's houses were burned.

    Experts in translation, computers, historic relic appraisal and reprography can apply to be volunteers during the construction period, the report said.

    The memorial hall covers 23,000 square meters on the west of Nanjing, capital city of Jiangsu Province. The expanding construction will last for two years, involving a new hall of 21,500 square meters to the east of the original one, which will be an exhibition hall and an open square, the report said.

    The donation details will be publicized soon, said an official from the memorial.  Enditem