Dong Fangxiao is seen in action on the beam at the Sydney Olympic Games on September 19, 2000. Photo: Popperfoto/Getty Images

By Guo Qiang

A nearly 10-year Olympic investigation into age-falsification claims against China has resulted in the country being stripped of a medal.

The athlete in question, Dong Fangxiao, was found to be only 14 at the 2000 Sydney Games. She was one of the gymnastic squad members and helped her team win a bronze medal that will have to be returned.

The Federation International of Gymnastics (FIG) ordered that China must also pay the cost of the investigation.

China also came under fire at the 2008 Beijing Games because of allegations that it was using underage gymnasts, with other countries pointing to official online records that were later removed. The government provided passports and birth certificates for the athletes in question and no action was taken by the FIG.

Chinese sports authorities said Sunday that it was "extremely regrettable" that the FIG Executive Committee decided to void Dong's results.

Lu Shanzhen, who led the Chinese women's gymnastics team in Sydney, claimed Sunday that there was insufficient evidence that Dong's age was falsified when participating in competition in 1999 and 2000, according to an interview with news portal 163.com.

Attempts to contact Lu through her cell phone were unsuccessful Sunday.

The Chinese Gymnastics Association (CGA) said Saturday in a statement posted on its official website that the governing body would further investigate the matter and didn't rule out asking for further explanation or seeking an appeal.

Under the current age rules set by FIG, gymnasts younger than 16 are forbidden to participate at major championships and the Olympics – to protect the health of young athletes.

Lu said that the CGA would do its best to minimize the loss of the medal by further communicating with the FIG, the IOC and Dong and strictly controlling age falsifications in major competitions by complying with relevant regulations set by the FIG.

Dong's results from the 1999 world championships, where she finished sixth in the all-around event, will be also voided, the FIG said.

On the FIG's official website, a profile of Dong shows that she was born on January 20, 1983. However, her accreditation card at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games says that her birth date was January 23, 1986.

Yang Yun, Dong's teammate, who admitted in a TV interview later that she was 14 at the time of the Sydney Olympics, was given a warning Saturday, as "the concrete and objective evidence available is insufficient to prove that the birth date indicated on the official documents was falsified."

The FIG announced in June that it would investigate age falsification surrounding Yang, the uneven bars bronze winner.

Age falsification has long been a problem in gymnastics.

The North Korean women's gymnastics team listed the age of Kim Gwang suk as 15 for three consecutive years at three separate international competitions. Romanian athletes have also been caught cheating.

Age is an issue in gymnastics because younger athletes have a competitive edge over older ones, according to Ren Hai, a professor of sports culture at Beijing Sports University.

"Younger gymnasts learn stunts faster and are bold in experimenting with highly difficult stunts," he said.

And because their bodies are still developing, experts say, the younger athletes are often more limber and smaller.

The age restriction, Ren said, is meant to protect athletes' developing bodies.

"Children who undertake excessive amounts of exercises and practice highly difficult stunts at an early age are likely to suffer lifelong damage to their body," he said.

China has been suspected of using underage competitors for years in other sports as well, including basketball, soccer and table tennis. As a result, local authorities have acted to prevent such fraud.

The Chinese Table Tennis Association, for instance, said last year that athletes who fail two consecutive bone-age tests will be prohibited from attending contests for a year.

It will also disqualify a team found to have two members who fail the age tests.

A recurring issue

The age claims during the 2008 Olympic Games involved He Kexin, who won two gold for China, and teammate Jiang Yuyuan. Many countries claimed they were as young as 14.

But He, along with teammates Jiang, Yang Yilin, Li Shanshan and Deng Linlin, were cleared of the allegations by the FIG two months after they won China's first ever Olympic team gold in women's gymnastics.

Yi Jianlian, a Chinese NBA player, is also suspected of lying about his age.

Yi has never admitted the claims are true, but his middle school registration form available online shows that his birth date is October 27, 1984, contradicting his contention that he was born in 1987.

Last year, the Chinese Football Association was fined $3,000 after the Asian Football Association found that Chinese player Yang Zi had altered his age in two different competitions.

Wang Wei, a sports fan in Beijing, told the Global Times that he doesn't know whether to trust the results of contests, as there are increasingly more scandals involving age fabrication concerning both Chinese athletes and those from other countries.

"A trust crisis is now gripping international sports and will dishearten our fans," he said.

Wang Dazhao, a sports commentator for People's Daily, told the Global Times that China's strong desire to win at international games has contributed to the fabrication of athletes' ages.

"Athletes are innocent and should not be held responsible for the matter," he said. "Some coaches are just too eager to win at high-profile games, and sports officials usually turn a blind eye to the matter."

He said it's high time for Chinese sports practitioners to reflect on whether it is worthy of fabricating ages in case these scandals are being used as a basis for other countries to accuse China.

Song Shengxia contributed to this story