A full size replica of parts of Beijing’s nationally sensitive Old Summer Palace has opened 1,000km from China’s capital, Beijing, state media reported yesterday, despite managers of the original building threatening legal action.
The vast array of gardens, palaces and lakes in the western suburbs of the Chinese capital was used by Qing Dynasty emperors in the 19th century.
The original site is regarded as a symbol of national humiliation in China after it was sacked by British and French troops in 1860 in response to the capture, torture and killing of members of a delegation from the two European nations.
Photo: AFP
Communist authorities tout it as an example of the nation’s victimization by foreign powers as the complex — parts of which were designed by French and Italian Jesuit missionaries — was looted again by forces from the US, Russia and Britain in 1900.
The first stage of the sprawling 400 hectare replica in the eastern Zhejiang Province on Sunday opened its doors to tourists despite being plagued by a “never-ending debate,” the Beijing News said.
The 30 billion yuan (US$4.8 billion) attraction is to eventually feature a replica of 95 percent of the Old Summer Palace, state media said.
While the original, known as the Yuanmingyuan, is now mainly ruins, managers of the site last month threatened legal action “if the replica infringed intellectual property rights,” Xinhua news agency reported.
“[The original complex] is unique and cannot be replicated,” the venue’s administrative office said in a statement sent to Xinhua. “The construction and development of the site should be planned by national organizations, and any replication of it should reach certain standards.”
Bosses at the newly-built attraction hit back, saying the replica “recreated classic architecture to share history with the younger generation,” Xinhua said.
The project “bears no conflict of interests with the one in Beijing,” attraction spokesperson Xu Wenrong told the agency.
A Yuanmingyuan Society of China spokesperson also backed the new attraction, telling Xinhua it was “a good experiment” because the palace could not be recreated on its original site.
The replica is being built within a giant film studio complex by Hengdian Group, which also includes copies of sections of Beijing’s Forbidden City, the main residence of China’s imperial rulers.
Reports said ticket prices for the new attraction were set at 280 yuan, but some visitors were not impressed with the palace.
“[It is] just a place full of empty rooms,” one visitor told Xinhua. “I cannot sense history here, something is missing.”
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