Together with a mascot of the Beijing 2022 Winter Paralympic Games, students of Taipingzhuang Center Primary School showcase their skating skills on a rink at the school in Beijing in January. (Photo by Li Yan/For China Daily)
China will participate in all six sports in the Beijing 2022 Winter Paralympics and the nation's delegation will be officially announced on Monday, an official with the China Disabled Persons' Federation said on Sunday.
The 13th Paralympic Winter Games will be held in Beijing and Zhangjiakou, a city in the neighboring Hebei province, from March 4 to 13, featuring six sports and 78 events. The sports are para wheelchair curling, para ice hockey, para cross-country skiing, para biathlon, para alpine skiing, and para snowboarding.
Yong Zhijun, deputy director of the sports department of the federation, said the number of national athletes for Winter Paralympics has grown quickly. "With our endeavors, Chinese athletes will participate in events of all six sports of the Beijing 2022 Winter Paralympics," Yong said. Although China's Winter Paralympic started late, it has been catching up and growing stronger in recent years.
The successful bid for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics and Paralympics is an opportunity to better promote it in China, Yong said. Before 2015, China only trained for two of the six sports in the Paralympic Winter Games, which were para cross-country skiing and wheelchair curling. "China's wheelchair curling team won the gold medal and also the first Paralympic medal ever at the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Paralympics," he said.
The federation has been encouraging and helping China's physically challenged population to take part in winter sports in recent years. People with disabilities take part in about 300,000 ice and snow activities every year in China, Yong said.
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