Tong Zeng has received over 10,000 letters which expose the crimes committed by the Japanese invaders.

Chinese civil claims against the Japanese government for the victims of Japanese invasion aims to promote China-Japan peace and friendship, Chinanews.com reported Monday, quoting an activist.

The year 2018 marks the 40th anniversary of the signing of the China-Japan Treaty of Peace and Friendship. For 28 consecutive years, Chinese victims have been filing claims, hoping the Japanese government will face up to the history and provide compensation for the survivors, said Tong Zeng, president of the China Federation of Civil Claims against Japan, an association that helps fund the activities.

Tong Zeng, once a researcher who graduated from China’s prestigious Peking University with a master’s degree in law, started the campaign in 1990 after he was inspired by a report on European countries re-lodging of post-war compensation claims for victims.

In the early 1990s, Tong made a sensation by publishing a 10-thousand-word article, stating the urgent needs for Chinese WWII victims’ compensation claims. Afterward, Tong received letters from victims all across China hoping for an apology and compensation.

In 1992, the China Federation of Civil Claims against Japan was established after Tong called on the victims to sue the Japanese government for slaughtering Chinese people, indiscriminate bombings, forced labor, and sex slavery. The claims won support from various groups, including overseas Chinese lawyers, volunteers, and more than 300 lawyers and friendly people from Japan. Nearly 30 lawsuits were filed against Japan for post-war compensation from 1994, but not a single case was judged impartially.

Until 2016, Mitsubishi Materials Corporation, a Japanese manufacturer, apologized for the forced labors during WWII, and promised to pay each victim or relative of a victim 100 thousand RMB and erect a monument for the future Japanese generation to remember the history.

This is a milestone in the past 28 years’ efforts to claim, said Tong.

To better preserve the history, Tong Zeng compiled the letters written by victims of Japanese troops after they invaded China in 1931, and started to digitize the important historical evidence online since 2014.

Recently, a printing press in Northeast China's Liaoning Province announced it would publish a book consisting of 100 letters to record what happened during the Japanese invasion. The book will be published in both Chinese and English.

An apology to the victims or the descendants of the deceased is the minimum requirement, said Tong Zeng. The victims expect the Japanese government to admit war crimes committed by Japanese troops during WWII, and their common wish is to develop the China-Japan friendship.