Apr 3, 2006, 13:47 GMT
Beijing - Ex-heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson said he was humbled by a visit to the mausoleum of former Chinese leader Mao Zedong in Beijing, state media said on Monday.
'I felt really insignificant next to the remains of Chairman Mao,' the Beijing Times newspaper quoted Tyson as saying.
'This is a great honour to be able to visit the (Chairman Mao) memorial hall,' he said.
Tyson, 39, wore a T-shirt with a picture of NBA basketball star Shaquille O'Neal during his 'unexpected' visit to the mausoleum on Saturday, the newspaper said.
Tyson, who sports a large tattoo of Mao on his right arm, also bought several books about the former Chinese leader, it said.
The main purpose of his three-day visit to China was to promote a Shanghai nightclub.
In 1986, Tyson, then 20, became the youngest champion in heavyweight boxing history.
Mao rose to power in China's ruling Communist Party during the Japanese occupation and later civil war in the 1930s and 1940s, winning praise for his guerrilla tactics.
After victory over the Nationalists in the civil war, Mao proclaimed the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949.
Many people hold him personally responsible for 30 million deaths from famine after the Great Leap Forward (1958) and more deaths and persecutions in the Cultural Revolution, which ended with Mao's death in 1976.
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