Thursday's official ceremony in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, was the focal point for remembrance of the 1937 massacre, unleashed when the Japanese Imperial Army entered what had been the Chinese capital.

For people in this city and the rest of China, the enormous psychological scars still remain.

This does not mean that we're a nation that holds a grudge. Nanjing rolled out the welcome mat for Japanese Emperor Akihito in 1992 during the first visit to China by a Japanese monarch. He issued a statement of regret for the suffering Japan caused.