KUNMING -- Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, said Monday that education should be closely linked with the fate of the country and the future of the Chinese nation.

He made the remarks during an inspection at the former site of the National Southwest Associated University in Kunming of Southwest China's Yunnan province.

The NSAU was a coalition between Peking and Tsinghua universities in Beijing and Tianjin's Nankai University during the Chinese People's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression.

China's current education goal is to nurture a new generation of capable and aspirational young people with a sense of historical responsibility to join the socialist cause, Xi said.