Japan yesterday denied a media report that its prime minister would later in the year visit Nanjing, a city where the Japanese army had killed nearly 300,000 Chinese in 1937.

The French newspaper Le Figaro reported Monday that Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama would pay "a reconciliatory visit" to Nanjing. It also said that, following the visit, Tokyo would likely invite Chinese leaders to Hiroshima, one of the two cities in Japan that was devastated by US atomic bombs to end World War II.

However, a senior official with the Japanese Foreign Ministry, who declined to be named, said in Tokyo yesterday that such a visit was unlikely.

"No. There is no such instruction or preparations for it. It is just the expectation of some people who are keen to strengthen relations with China," the official said.

The news has come at a time when a semi-official group of scholars from China and Japan are planning to announce the results of a three-year joint study on both countries' history this month.

Insiders revealed that the Japanese side had acknowledged the once disputed fact of the Nanjing Massacre, but that the two sides were still at odds about the number of victims of the massacre.