Shanghai, April 24:

No drug users, no tattoos, no heavy snorers. China’s military is tightening its standards for recruiting potential officers as it adjusts to changing social trends, ordering drug and psychological tests, the Xinhua News Agency reported today, citing a military health official.

The People’s Liberation Army headquarters released the new recruitment rules yesterday, it said.

Recruits with fashionable tattoos will be barred from military schools, although traditional tattoos of ethnic minorities will be allowed if they are not too obvious when the recruit is wearing summer shorts, Li Chunming, the army health official, was cited as saying. “Tattoos will tarnish the military’s image, even the scars of removed tattoos,” Li said.

Heavy snorers will also be banned, he said. The report did not say how the army would test for that problem.

The report cited an unnamed official as saying that the army began requiring urine tests for drugs because of a surge in the number of young Chinese drug users.

The psychological assessment will involve a written test followed by an interview for those who perform well enough, the report cited Miao Danmin, a professor with the Psychology Research Institute of the Fourth PLA Medical College, as saying.