The East Asian Cup Women's Softball Championships opened Thursday in Zhongshan, Guangdong province, a major national base for softball. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

The East Asian Cup Women's Softball Championships opened Thursday in Zhongshan, Guangdong province, a major national base for softball.

The event, hosted by the China Softball Association and Dongsheng Township government, was attended by five international high-level professional softball teams from South Korea, Hong Kong, the Chinese mainland, Japan and Chinese Taipei.

Nearly 130 umpires, coaches and athletes will compete during the three and a half-day competition, which will be the last session of the East Asian Cup women's baseball championship.