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China plans to restore a badly damaged Buddhist monastery in a remote northwest Tibetan region as a memorial to the 2,698 people killed by a devastating earthquake more than a year ago.

The government has approved the restoration of the ruins of the 750-year-old Trangu monastery and work there will begin soon, officials of Yushu Tibet autonomous prefecture of Qinghai province said on Monday.

The monastery, nestled among mountains near the township of Gyegu, was reduced to barely more than a mound of rubble by the earthquake. The foundations of the main hall and the scripture hall survived but were hardly recognizable among the crumpled walls and fallen roofs.

Twenty-three monks at the monastery died in the quake, which also leveled most buildings in Gyegu on April 14, 2010. Thousands of sculptures of Buddha and scrolls of scripture were buried under the rubble.

Trangu is one of the three most important monasteries in Yushu, a predominantly Tibetan region with 350,000 residents, most of whom are Tibetan Buddhists.

"The monastery was an invaluable relic, with a rich cultural value that is hard to replicate," said Dong Zhiqiang, deputy head of the provincial cultural heritage bureau.

"By preserving it, we can save the precious cultural resource for future generations."

Trangu's lama Lodroe Nyima Rinpoche said the government pledged an initial investment of 4 million yuan ($640,000) for the preservation while the monastery will work to raise more funds to develop the site into a comprehensive memorial park.

The lama said construction of a new monastery is in full swing and monks are expected to move into the new site before Yushu's frigid winter arrives.

The central government said it would spend 990 million yuan to restore the 87 monasteries damaged in the quake. About 63 percent of the restoration has been completed, officials said.

Li Chenggang, chief engineer for the preservation of the Trangu ruins, described the project as the "most challenging" in his 50-year career in civil engineering.

He said that it was difficult enough to consolidate a fragile structure that was made of a mixture of cement, mound and straw. And the construction crews were asked not to alter the exterior of the monastery.

Construction in a mountainous region with an average elevation above sea level of 3,700 meters added extra challenges to the work, Li added.

（中國日報網英語點津 Helen 編輯）

About the broadcaster:

?Christine Mallari is an intern at China Daily. She was born in Chicago, Illinois and raised in a nearby suburb before moving for college. After recently graduating from the University of Iowa with a degree in English, Journalism and Mass Communications, she moved to Beijing to work with China Daily. Though she has been working in journalism since high school, this is her first time doing so abroad.