China loves (some) journalists: Iris Chang to receive official commemoration

A new initiative to erect two clay models in memory of Iris Chang brings together eminent Chinese artists, scholars, and party apparatchiks. In 1997, Chang published The Rape of Nanking — The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II, an elaborate account of atrocities committed by Japanese soldiers between 1937 and 1945.

Chang often criticized Japan’s failure to repent and accept responsibility for its past in International forums, and her book, originally published in English, was a source of embarrassment for the Japanese government.

Chang was a reporter for AP and the Chicago Tribune. She was born in New Jersey to a family of Chinese immigrants. In November last year, she was found dead in her San Francisco apartment. While the official cause of death was suicide, some – especially on online discussion boards – blame it on Japanese and/or American agents.