BEIJING (Reuters) - China's Shaolin Temple, the cradle of
Chinese kung fu, is demanding an apology from an Internet user who
said its monks had once been beaten in unarmed combat by a Japanese
ninja, Chinese media reported on Friday.
"The so-called defeat is purely fabricated, and we demand the
Internet user to apologise to the whole nation for the wrongs he or
she did," the Beijing News said, citing a notice announced by a
lawyer for the Shaolin monks.
Relations between Chinese and Japanese are sensitive at the best of
times, with emotions still running high over Japan's invasion and
occupation of parts of China in the first half of the 20th
Century.
The Internet user, calling themselves "Five Minutes Every Day",
said on an online forum last week that a Japanese ninja came to
Shaolin, asked for a fight and many monks failed to beat him, the
newspaper said.
"The facts that the monks could not defeat a Japanese ninja showed
that they were named as kung fu masters in vain," the Internet user
was quoted as saying in the post.
The Shaolin temple "strongly condemned the horrible deeds" of the
user, the newspaper said.
"It is not only extremely irresponsible behaviour with respect to
the Shaolin temple and its monks, but also to the whole martial art
and Chinese nation," it quoted the monks as saying.
