The government of Nanjing, capital of east China's Jiangsu Province, has decided to expand the scale of the existing Nanjing Memorial Hall of Compatriots Murdered in the Nanjing Massacre and build a world peace square and a park nearby, a municipal government source said here Monday.

The move is designed to mark the 60th anniversary of the victory in the World War against Fascism as well as the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression in China (1937-1945).

The expansion project expected to occupy an area of 180,450 square meters. The resettlement project, due to start Tuesday, will be completed by the end of May, said a government official in charge of civil engineering in the city.

More than 300,000 Chinese civilians were slain in the Nanjing Massacre, which occurred after the intruding Japanese troops occupied Nanjing, the then capital of China, on Dec. 13, 1937, and some 20,000 women were raped in the one-month atrocity. And one third of the houses in the city were burned down in the city.

The Nanjing municipal government built a magnificent memorial hall at the Jiangdong Gate, where 300,000 civilians and armymen were killed during the infamous massacre, in 1985 in commemoration of the victims. The memorial hall was enlarged to present 28,000 square meters in 1995.