After a two-year renovation, the state-run memorial to the 1937 <span class='lingo'>Rape of Nanking</span> reopens Thursday in time to commemorate the 70th anniversary of what some call one of the most horrific atrocities in modern history. </PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>One measure of the &#165;7.8 billion project is the reported expansion of exhibition space from 800 to 6,000 sq. meters to re-emphasize the magnitude of the Nanjing Massacre, during which Beijing says 300,000 soldiers and civilians were slaughtered by invading Japanese forces in the former Chinese capital.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>However, recent political talks and academic debates over the massacre may be out of sync with the apparent propaganda on display at the renovated memorial hall, as some Chinese scholars appear to be willing to discuss the number of victims, a long-standing point of contention between Japan and China.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>'That is a great change compared with 10 years ago or so. Around that time, the victim figure was deleted from my thesis paper published by a Chinese university,' said professor Tokushi Kasahara, a noted Japanese expert on the Nanjing Massacre who has estimated that Japanese soldiers slaughtered between 100,000 and 200,000.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>In the past, one of the priorities of Chinese experts was to defend Beijing's official figure of 300,000 victims, allegedly to direct public sentiment against Japan.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>But in recent years, as President Hu Jintao and other top Chinese leaders attempt to smooth Japan-China relations, the Chinese Communist Party appears to be putting less pressure on Chinese scholars.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>Last month, Kasahara attended a symposium in Nanjing to commemorate publication of 55 volumes of historical materials on the massacre. </PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>He found that some Chinese scholars were open to discussing Beijing's estimate of the death count, with some even directly questioning the official figures.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>Most Japanese academics who have examined historical records and documents believe Beijing's figure of roughly 300,000 is exaggerated. The estimates of Japanese experts range from 10,000 to more than 200,000.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>In a speech delivered at the <span class='lingo'>Nippon Foundation</span> in Tokyo earlier this year, Cheng Zhaoqi, a research fellow at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, said, 'Recently, I wrote a long thesis in which I became the first Chinese –

who argued that it is impossible to determine the number of victims killed based on the historical materials (available) now.

"If I were the director of the museum in Nanjing, I wouldn't write the figure in the first place," Cheng said, referring to a huge sign on the war museum's exterior that simply states "300,000."

Nanjing, the former capital of China, fell to the Imperial Japanese Army, spearheaded by the Shanghai Expeditionary Force, on Dec. 13, 1937.

The Japanese army suffered from severe food shortages and was ill-prepared to handle the huge numbers of prisoners after the battle to take Nanjing.