People lay a wreath during a memorial ceremony in Richmond Hill, Greater Toronto Area, Canada, Dec. 13, 2019. Hundreds of people attended a memorial ceremony on Friday to commemorate the victims in Nanjing Massacre 82 years ago. (Photo:Xinhua)

 The Chinese communities in Greater Toronto Area held a memorial service on Friday to commemorate the victims of the Nanjing Massacre.

Hundreds of people, including lawmakers from the Canadian Parliament, the Legislative Assembly of Ontario and Toronto City Council, attended the service at the Nanjing Massacre Victims Monument, which was set up by the Confederation of Toronto Chinese Canadian Organizations and Chinese Freemasons of Canada (Toronto) in Richmond Hill of Greater Toronto Area last year.

The book-shape monument covers an area of 90 square meters. It is 3.72 meters high, 4.88 meters long, and 9.2 meters wide. It is made of black marble. It is a symbol of a black and heavy period of human history.

Weng Guonin, president of the Confederation of Toronto Chinese Canadian Organizations (CTCCO), told Xinhua that the public memorial service is meant to remember the history of World War II and to maintain a lasting peace in the world.

"The Nanjing Massacre is the tragedy of Chinese and is also the humiliation of human beings. Today's public memorial service will help people of all backgrounds understand the tragic history of the Nanjing Massacre, value peace and safeguard justice," said the CTCCO president.

"We remember the Nanjing Massacre, not because of hatred. We remember Nanjing Massacre because it is a lesson for every human being that we need to spread to everyone in the education system, to our children, to our students, so that when they grow up, they will try to avoid war. So this is a lesson for the whole humankind," said Joseph Wong, founder and chair of the Association for Learning and Preserving the History of World War II in Asia (ALPHA)

In 2017, the Ontario parliament unanimously passed a motion to recognize Dec. 13 as Nanjing Massacre Commemorative Day in the Canadian province.

On Dec. 13, 1937, the Japanese army bombed Nanjing and went on a murderous rampage through the city, then China's capital, killing 300,000 Chinese in the following six weeks.