People around China held a series of activities on Saturday to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the death of Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the forerunner of Chinese democratic revolution.

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

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

Commemorating ceremonies were held in the memorial hall of Wuchang Uprising in central China's Hubei Province, where the first gunshot of the revolution overthrew China's last feudal regime Qing Dynasty (1616-1911).

A picture exhibition was opened in Shanghai on Saturday to present Sun Yat-sen's glorious life and achievement. A seminar was held in Fuzhou, capital of east China's Fujian Province, to commemorate Sun Yat-Sen.  

(Xinhua News Agency March 13, 2005)