China yesterday paid her respects in the 95th anniversary of the death of Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the renowned statesman who led a revolution that ended imperial rule. With Dr. Sun founding the Republic of China in Nanjing, the city was among those once again observing his passing.
Sun is regarded as a great national hero, a great patriot and a great pioneer of the Chinese democratic revolution. The Doctor founded the Republic in Nanjing in 1912.
Crowds ascended the 392 steps of the Doctor’s imposing mausoleum in Nanjing yesterday morning as they always do. Yesterday though, they did so in solemnity. In the sacrificial hall, the viewing area of Sun’s white marble statue was flooded with flowers. The arrivals, dressed in dark colours, stood in line to take their turn to bow.
Representatives of the Communist Party of China, as well as local and regional governments, turned out in force to pay their respects through the offering of flower baskets, reported The Paper.
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In Beijing, representatives from all divisions of society gathered in Zhongshan Park to hold a brief and solemn ceremony to commemorate the anniversary. They observed a moment of silence, then they too bowed three times before Sun’s statue.
The anniversary was marked in Shanghai in the former residence of Sun on Xiangshan Lu. Four magnificent remembrance flower arrangements had been placed beside Sun’s bronze statue by local authorities. Members thereof and selected representatives of the general public took their turn to bow and remember the Doctor’s historic achievements.
In Sun’s birthplace of Zhongshan City, Guangdong Province (then Cuiheng of Xiangshan County), the Doctor’s former residence was the setting for another ceremony, at which were observed the same formalities.
Sun died in Beijing at the age of 59, on 12 March, 1925. One week later, his coffin was moved to Zhongshan Park. In this last week of the month, 76,800 people went to pay their respects. After the funeral on 2 April, the coffin was temporarily placed in the stone tower of Biyun Temple in Xishan, Beijing. On 26 May, Dr. Sun’s coffin was brought to Nanjing, for a 1 June internment on Purple Mountain.
