Shanghai's Jewish ghetto to apply for world memory list

Want China Times, Xinhua 2015-02-07

A visitor to the Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum takes photos of a wall
inscribed with the Jewish refugee list, Sept. 3, 2014. (File photo/Xinhua)

Shanghai plans to apply for the neighborhood that sheltered Jewish refugees during WWII to be inscribed on the UNESCO Memory of the World Register.

Shanghai accommodated about 20,000 Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi persecution. Many of them lived in the Tilanqiao area of Hongkou District.

The city has completed collation of the refugee list, data bank, literary, video and audio material, said Chen Jian, curator of the Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum which is working with the Hongkou district government on the application.

This year is the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II.

Apart from the world memory application, Shanghai has also announced plans to rebuild a cafe where Jewish refugees socialized during their sojourn in the city.