German woman Edith Gunther has recently donated 41 photos to the Memorial Hall of the Victims in the Nanjing Massacre in east China's Jiangsu Province, presenting new evidence of the holocaust committed by Japanese invaders during the Second World War.

The photos were all copies of pictures taken by Edith's husband, Karl, who, together with other friendly foreigners, helped set up a refugee camp at the Jiangnan Cement Plant during the massacre, saving as many as 50,000 lives.

Karl Gunther took great risks in taking pictures reflecting life in the Qixia Temple and Jiangnan Cement Plant refugee camps between the winter of 1937 and the spring of 1938, and the demolishing of the cement plant by Japanese troops.

"These pictures preserved by foreign nationals will help reveal the truth of the Nanjing Massacre and offer new evidence against the vicious arguments of Japanese rightists who have attempted to deny the aggressors' crimes," Zhu Chengshan, head of the memorial hall, said at the donation ceremony.

About 300,000 Chinese were killed by Japanese troops after the fall of Nanjing, the then capital of the Kuomintang government, in the winter of 1937.

( April 8, 2002)