A Taiwanese businessman in Chongqing has donated 500,000 yuan (US$ 60,200) to build a memorial wall in the city to mark the bombing of an air-raid tunnel by Japanese invaders in 1941.

Cai Deyi, president of association of Taiwanese investors in Chongqing, said a bronze relief wall will be erected soon near the site of the tunnel, in which over 2,500 civilians suffocated after Japanese soldiers bombed the tunnel on June 5, 1941.

He said the eight-meter-long and 7-meter-high wall features abstract art to show the bombing and expose the atrocities committed by the Japanese aggressors.

Born in Taiwan in 1949, Cai said he still remembers the bombing stories told by some of his primary school teachers who were witnesses to the attack.

According to historical records, Japan launched 6,800 air-raids against Chongqing between January 1938 and August 1943, killing or injuring more than 20,000 people and leaving over 60,000 buildings in ruins.

"History can never be changed or reversed. Both the Chinese people and Japanese people should learn from the past," Cai added.

The area of Chongqing, now China's largest and youngest municipality, has a history of more than 3,000 years.

In 1940, Chongqing was made a "wartime capital" by the Kuomintang government and at the time was the political, economic, commercial, financial transportation, cultural, and diplomatic center of the country.