While China was torn by continuous war, succeeded in rapidly modernizing its military with its sights on Korea and Manchuria. Maneuvered by Japan, declared independence from Qing China's suzerainty in 1894, leading to the , which resulted in China's humiliating secession of both Korea and to Japan. Following these series of defeats, for Qing China to become a modern Meiji-style constitutional monarchy was drafted by the Emperor Guangxu in 1898, but was opposed and stopped by the Empress Dowager Cixi, who placed Emperor Guangxu under house arrest in a coup d'état. Further destruction followed the ill-fated 1900 against westerners in . By the early twentieth century, mass civil disorder had begun, and calls for reform and revolution were heard across the country. The 38 year-old Emperor Guangxu died under house arrest on November 14, 1908, suspiciously just a day before Cixi. With the throne empty, he was succeeded by Cixi's handpicked heir, her two year old nephew , who became the Xuantong Emperor, the last Chinese emperor. Guangxu's consort, who became the , signed the abdication decree as regent in 1912, ending two thousand years of imperial rule in China. She died, childless, in 1913., Google's service, offered free of charge, instantly translates words, phrases, and web pages between English and over 100 other languages., China is a unitary communist state led by the CCP that self-designates as a socialist state. It is one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council; the UN representative for China was changed from the ROC to the PRC in 1971..