Chinese youth not fit enough to fight Japanese "in future war"

Beijing Sports University president Yang Hua said the Chinese government invest in improving the fitness of teenagers and ensure that children take regular exercise. Hua was addressing the sports group of the advisory body to China's annual parliament.

"It is time for the Chinese nation to improve the physical fitness of our next generation," said Yang. "If we miss the next three to five years a whole generation will be next to useless.

"If there was another war against Japan, would the younger Chinese be able to fight the Japanese one-on-one?

"A survey has shown that Chinese teenagers are behind their Japanese peers in almost every indicator it measured," Jiang Xiaoyu, a senior member of the organizing committee for the Beijing Games, told the meeting.

"The physical fitness of the young is a matter of strengthening our country and our Chinese race."

Japan invaded and occupied much of China between 1931 and 1945. Since then, Japan's wartime atrocities have influenced Chinese public sentiment toward Japan and its people.