People around China held a series of activities Sunday to commemorate the 81st anniversary of the death of Dr. Sun Yat-sen, a forerunner of the Chinese democratic revolution.

Dr. Sun Yat-sen, who died of illness in Beijing (then called Beiping) on March 12, 1925, was born in 1866 in Xiangshan County (now Zhongshan City) in south China's Guangdong Province.

Dr. Sun is known across the country as a "great revolutionist and statesman" who fought against feudalism and imperialist aggression and for the independence and freedom of the Chinese people.

Solemn commemorating ceremonies were held in Beijing and Shanghai.

More than 100 people from all walks of life gathered at the Memorial Hall of Wuchang Uprising in Wuhan, the capital of central China's Hubei province, where the first gunshot of the revolution was fired to overthrow China's last feudal regime Qing Dynasty (1616-1911).

A picture exhibition has been opened in a museum of Wuhan to display Sun Yat-sen's revolutionary activities in southeast Asia.

Source: Xinhua