China may hold war parade at Marco Polo bridge, site of first conflict with Japan

China’s planned military parade to mark the end of the second world war is likely to be held at the site Japan attacked in 1937 to trigger the Second Sino-Japanese war, according to two officials with direct knowledge of the plan.

The September parade to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Japan’s defeat will probably be held at a square next to Beijing’s Marco Polo bridge, rather than at Tiananmen Square, where military processions are traditionally held, said the officials, who asked not to be named as the plan has not yet been made public.

The parade risks further straining relations between China and Japan. Asia’s two largest economies dispute the sovereignty of islands in the East China Sea and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe angered Beijing in 2013 when he visited a Tokyo shrine that honours Japanese war dead, including convicted war criminals, that is seen in China as a symbol of Japan’s past aggression.

The government in Beijing plans to invite world leaders to the commemorations of China’s “War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression as well as the World Anti-Fascist War”, the Foreign Ministry said on its website on March. 2. The site in the Lugouqiao area is home to the Museum of the War of Chinese People’s Resistance Against Japanese Aggression.

“It’s a way of showing that they have absolutely no interest in improving relations with Japan,” said Robert Dujarric, director of the Institute of Contemporary Asian Studies at Temple University Japan Campus. “Rather than symbolising the defeat of the Fascists, the Axis, it would commemorate the victory over Japan because Marco Polo bridge has nothing to do with the Fuhrer or Mussolini.”

The government favours holding the parade at Lugouqiao, but will make the final decision based on a security review, one of the officials said.