A Chinese company has announced a 1 billion yuan (US$165 million) project to build a life-sized Titanic replica.

It is set to become the centerpiece for a new theme park in central China.

The Chinese version of "the unsinkable ship" will be permanently parked at a tourism resort in the little-known Daying county in Sichuan province.

Su Shaojun, CEO of the Seven Star Energy Investment Group said that the universal love and sense of responsibility shown during the Titanic shipwreck represented spiritual richness of the human civilization. 

The luxury liner sank in 1912 during her maiden voyage, taking the lives of 1,500 passengers on board.

Some say that building a theme park around such tragedy is inappropriate but the project has a champion in actor Bernard Hill, who played captain Edward Smith in the 1997 blockbuster movie.

"It's been approached in a very delicate and a very sensitive way, and they're very aware of the extent of the disaster."

The Titanic replica is set to begin construction later this year and is scheduled to be completed in 2016.

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