A group from Japan visits three Chinese women in Harbin on Tuesday who raised children abandoned by Japanese families after World War II. Three Japanese visitors had been among those children, but none had been raised by the women. [Photo by Liu Yang/China Daily]

A group from Japan mourned victims of Japan’s invasion and occupation of northeastern China before and during World War II and called on their leaders to visit China to apologize for war crimes on Tuesday.

The group of 41 was organized by people abandoned as children in China by Japanese families at the end of the war, and included three of them who had returned to Japan. The visit took place on Qingming Festival, the most important occasion for Chinese to honor the dead.

They visited Unit 731 Museum in Harbin, capital of Heilongjiang Province, and mourned the more than 3,000 people tortured and killed there. Unit 731 was the Japanese army’s germ warfare division, which engaged in experiments on humans.

“It’s horrifying to see some of the items on display. Some of them were beyond what I could bear to see,” said Nakajima Yohachi, who helped organize the visit.

More than 4,000 Japanese children were adopted in China after World War II, according to media reports. Most have gone back to Japan.

Nakajima, 75, moved to Heilongjiang in 1942 with his family but was abandoned in 1945. He returned to Japan in 1958. He said he wouldn’t have survived if it were not for his Chinese parents.

The left-behind children also met with three of the adoptive mothers and gave them gifts. The children they adopted were not in the group.

“Many Japanese are deceived as the history is either distorted or understated in Japanese textbooks,” Nakajima said. “We volunteered to come with our own money. We are all peace lovers. We hope Japanese people will gain more knowledge of history, and we also hope there will be no war anymore.

“I think Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe should come to China to apologize for the atrocities and reflect on history. If he doesn’t come, many Japanese like me will feel sorry for that,” he added.

Japanese dancer Yasuda Yuka, 34, said the atrocities were beyond her imagination.

“I am angry and sad as there are few records in Japanese textbooks about this history. Many young Japanese don’t know history well and many even think it’s dangerous to come to China,” she said.

Six of those abandoned who still live in China accompanied the group. Gao Fengqin, 74, was adopted after her father was killed in the war when she was 5, but she still couldn’t go back to Japan, which does not recognize her identity. “I am looking forward to going back to hunt for my roots,” she said. “But forever, China is my home.”

China is the largest exporter of military drones today, and it is ready to place a new model on the international market.

The TYW-1, developed by Beihang University in Beijing, one of China’s top institutes for science and technology, is an unmanned aircraft for reconnaissance and combat based on the BZK-005 high-altitude, long-range reconnaissance drone, which the university also developed.

The BZK-005 is widely used by the People’s Liberation Army and has performed many operations, foreign media have reported.

The drone is to make its maiden flight in September and will be placed on the international market in 2018, according to Wang Jianping, deputy general manager and chief designer at Beihang Unmanned Aircraft System Technology.

The firm was set up by Beihang University, formerly known as Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, to develop and market drones.

“We aim to tap the markets in neighboring nations, as well as in Southeast Asia and the Middle East,” Wang said in an exclusive interview.

This would be the first time a Chinese university sells large unmanned combat aircraft on the international market. Northwestern Polytechnical University in Xi’an, Shaanxi province, has sold small, unarmed military drones to foreign buyers.

The best-known Chinese military drones are the Wing Loong family, made by Aviation Industry Corp of China, and China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp’s CH series.

CH drones have been sold to military users in more than 10 countries, while the Wing Loong II, which made its maiden flight in late February, has received the largest contract ever for a Chinese drone made for export.

Though facing competition, Wang said he has confidence in the TYW-1 because it is based on the BZK-005, which has proved itself with an outstanding service record.

“It’s fair to say the BZK-005 is the best aerodynamic design in China, as it has the best lift-to-drag ratio of the drones of its kind,” he said. Lift-to-drag ratio is a key indicator of an aircraft’s capability.

“Taking advantage of the good design of the BZK-005, the TYW-1 will be able to fly for about 40 hours. With a maximum takeoff weight of 1,500kilograms, it will be capable of carrying six missiles or bombs with a total weight of 300 kg.”

Another edge of the TYW-1 is its high level of automation. Wang said the drone can autonomously take off and land, and will be able to track a target and strike without manual control.

“It’s very easy to learn how to operate this drone. It will take only a month to train an operator,” he said.

The TYW-1 also will be an open and modular platform, which means it can use equipment and weapons developed not only by Chinese companies, but also by other nations, he added.

Wang Ya’nan, editor-in-chief of Aerospace Knowledge, said the TYW-1 will have bright market prospects for two key reasons.

“First, its predecessor, the BZK-005, has a good reputation in this field through its performance in actual operations,” he said. “Second, the drone’s modular design will give users a wide range of options when it comes to the procurement of equipment and weapons, enabling them to choose the most suitable products.

“In addition, its long endurance in the sky will be attractive to nations that must monitor vast territorial waters.”

China’s Supreme People’s Procuratorate (SPP) has stressed tightened supervision over major environment-related cases.

The SPP will carry out special supervision focusing on air and water pollution from January 2017 to December 2018 in heavily polluted areas including the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the Yangtze River Delta, the three northeastern provinces and the Yangtze River valley.

From March 2015 to December 2016, 3,868 environment-related criminal cases involving 4,982 suspects were transferred to police by administrative agencies upon suggestions from procuratorates.

During the same period, procuratorates at all levels also supervised public security organs in investigating 4,853 people suspected of damaging the environment and resources, and transferred 171 cases of duty-related crimes involving 246 officials.

The SPP alone or in cooperation with the Ministry of Public Security and the Ministry of Environmental Protection directed the handling 62 major environmental violation cases during the period.

As people gathered to sweep tombs on Tomb-sweeping Day, some may find it hard to get one.

Suzhou city in eastern China’s Jiangsu province has banned the sale of tombs to people without a local hukou (household registration), unless there are “particular reasons.”

“Those who are not Suzhou citizens should get approval from the civil affairs authorities before they can buy a tomb here,” said Zhang Jihong, vice head of the civil affairs bureau of Suzhou.

Due to an aging society and urbanization, some cemeteries are already full. Many of the tombs do not belong to Suzhou citizens. The civil affairs bureau estimates that more than 6 million people will go to Suzhou to sweep tombs for their deceased relatives.

Many of the visitors are from Shanghai where the price of a tomb is almost double that in Suzhou. Also, there were no public cemeteries in Shanghai more than 30 years ago, so many chose Suzhou instead.

The policy was widely discussed online.

“After the house purchase restrictions for the living, officials are turning their eyes to the dead,” said Youming on Sina Weibo.

“People can not only speculate on houses but also on tombs,” said netizen Xingzhiyin.

Zhang hopes that public can understand the policy well. Suzhou had a similar policy in 2004, but it was not well implemented. Now that there are few spaces left in the cemeteries, the policy has been reiterated.

“But we are not keeping all the non-locals outside,” Zhang added. “For instance, those whose spouses are buried in Suzhou can still use the same grave after they die.”

The civil affairs authorities are also considering the demands of young people who have obtained a Suzhou hukou and need tombs for their non-Suzhou parents.

Police in central China’s Henan province have arrested 11 people on suspicion of involvement in the raping of minors.

According to a statement issued on Sunday by the Police Bureau of Kaifeng, Henan, a couple in Weishi county organized schoolgirls and forced them to have sex with two businessmen, both in their 40s.

The two businessmen were charged with rape. The couple and another two people were charged with organizing prostitution, which is punishable with sentences between five years and life in prison.

Another five people who took part in organizing the prostitution activities were detained.

The statement said police authorities at city and provincial levels arrived at Weishi county, which is under the jurisdiction of Kaifeng, a city known for being the capital for several dynasties in ancient China.

Police will thoroughly review the case, bring every criminal involved to justice and clamp down on crimes against minors, the statement said.

The news caught wide public attention after a Wechat post went viral, saying more than 30 middle school students in Weishi county were forced into prostitution.

Parents of the victims were shocked by the online post, which included the names and identification card numbers of their children, according to a news report from the Mirror, a Beijing newspaper.

The parents feared that the leak of personal information would bring the trauma of victimization to their children and asked police to help delete the information on the internet.

The report said the parents did not learn how their children’s personal information was leaked.

The case was uncovered when a victim told her aunt about what she went through and the aunt reported the case to police in February.

A mother of another victim told the Mirror that her girl said she was taken to a hotel room and was given 300 yuan ($44) after sex. The girl refused to accept the money.

Li Wei, a lawyer specializing in criminal law at Jie Qiang Law Firm in Beijing, said those who are convicted of raping multiple women or raping a minor who is under 14 face a severe penalty, which is normally between 10 years and life in prison, or even the death penalty if the rape resulted in severe harm, such as causing the death of a victim.

According to statistics from the Supreme People’s Court, the number of child molestation cases has risen in recent years. In 2012, 2,017 such cases were closed in courts across the country. The number rose to 2,828 in 2014.

The number of child sexual abuse cases filed in 2015 in the juvenile court of Beijing Second Intermediate People’s Court increased by 50 percent year-on-year.