A former Chinese journalist has admitted falling for an April Fool's joke which sparked a decades-long myth in China — that US officer cadets learnt from the example of People's Liberation Army hero Lei Feng.

Li Zhurun, a former reporter for Xinhua news agency who is now a university professor, made the confession on his Sina Weibo microblog.

Ever since late Chinese leader Mao Zedong recognized Lei Feng for his humble heroism, said to include washing his comrades' uniforms and giving his pay to the needy, authorities have encouraged citizens to do good and follow his example.

Pictures of Lei Feng wearing his trademark earflap army hat have become a pop icon emblazoned on everything from bags to cups.

In his posting, Li said he had been duped by an unspecified Western news outlet, which reported on April Fool's Day 1981 that the West Point military academy in New York State had held up the soldier as an example for all students.

"I was young at the time, and I didn't know that Western media often invent 'news' on April Fool's Day," Li wrote.

Over the past three decades, the West Point myth has become so entrenched in China that even a member of the country's advisory body, the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, cited it in a 2009 proposal urging Beijing to apply for UNESCO recognition of the "Lei Feng Spirit."

"At America's famous West Point, Lei Feng's portrait is among five hanging in the hall, and the academy's code of student conduct includes his famous quote: 'Human life is limited, but serving the people is limitless,'" CPPCC member Liu Jianglong said, according to the Chongqing Morning Post.

Lei Feng joined the PLA in 1960. He died aged 22 in August 1962 after a truck driven by a fellow soldier hit a telegraph pole, which fell on him.

Li called his report "one of the biggest mistakes of my life" and said he discovered his error when a Chinese magazine ran a 1997 expose on the issue.

"But I still feel that it was not enough, and I have always wanted to have the chance to cleanse (the rumor) on a wider scale," he wrote.

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