BY DONG YUNHU 

    In his report to the 17th Congress of the Communist Party of China, General Secretary Hu Jintao noted that the five years since the previous CPC National Congress have witnessed important progresses in China's reform and opening-up undertakings and in the national endeavor to build a society of relative prosperity in all respects. These five years, he said, has also seen a "sound development of (China's ) human rights cause." For the first time in its history, the CPC reviewed the development of the human rights cause as an important part of national development. This review serves as an objective, accurate description of the great progress China has made in the realm of human rights over the past five years.

   By taking "respect for and protection of human rights's as an important guideline for running the country and administering government, the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Hu Jintao as general secretary has, over the past five years, upheld a people-oriented policy and has persistently worked in the vital interests of the people. While working to ensure China's development in a scientific manner and harmony of the Chinese society, the Party has spared no effort to improve the livelihood of the people and protect human rights. It has made a range of breakthroughs in the realm of human rights, which are great enough to have drawn global attention and thanks to which a new horizon has been opened up for a continuous development of China's human rights cause.

I. Human rights have been taken by the Party as a core concept for its governance and have become an important theme of national Construction and Social Progress.

Human rights, as a concept, now constitute a core concept of the Party for governance of the country. The concept has become a constitutional principle, a mainstream subject in the political life of the Party and state--- his is the most eye-catching development China has achieved in the realm of human rights over the past five years.

"Respect for and protection of human rights" has been enshrined in the Constitution of the Communist Party of China, suggesting that the formulation is now an important concept and value followed by the Party in its work to run and invigorate the country.During a fairly long period after New China was born in 1949, the concept of human rights was wrongly criticized as a "bourgeois slogan," a fact attributed to influence of some "leftist" ideas on the Party. In November 1991, the Information Office of the State Council published the first-ever white paper on China’s human rights conditions. Breaking away from this leftist 'forbidden zone," the white paper defines "full realization of human rights" as a "lofty goal pursued by China under socialism." The concept of human rights was written down into the political reports to both the 15th and 16th congresses of the Party, which were held in September 1997 and November 2002, respectively, indicating that the Party had set "respect for and protection of human rights" as an important goal of the Party in its effort to run the country and develop a democratic legal system under its leadership.

   Since after the 16th CPC Congress, the Party Central Committee with Hu Jintao as general secretary has moved further by making "respect for and protection of human rights" a part of the philosophy for running the country, which calls for developing a scientific outlook toward development and building of a harmonious society. The Third Plenary Session of the 16th CPC Central Committee held in October 2003 advanced the scientific outlook toward development with the interests of the people as the basis. The interests of the people, it stressed, constitute the core or essence of the scientific outlook toward development. This people-oriented policy is meant to ensure "espect for and protection of human rights:---citizens' political, economic and cultural rights, to be exact".

   The 4th Plenary Session of the 16th CPC Central Committee in September 2004 adopted the Decision on Enhancing the Party’s Capability of Governance. The Decision obliges the Party to govern in a scientific, democratic and law-abiding way. It calls for respecting and protecting human rights, for "ensuring that the people shall enjoy extensive rights and freedom in accordance with the law" as an important part of the endeavor to enhance the Party's capability of governance.

   The Decision on Certain Important Questions Concerning the Building of a Socialist Harmonious Society, which was adopted by the 6th Plenary Session of the 16th CPC Central Committee, defines "respect for and protection of human rights" as of vital importance to the building of a socialist harmonious society. Adherence to the people-first policy is defined in the Decision as the principle of primary importance for the building of a harmonious society. The Decision stresses that in building a socialist harmonious society, the emphasis should be placed on resolution to "problems of interest the people concern most, problems that affect the most immediate, most tangible interests of the people." The Decision also calls for "improving the institutional guarantee for the people's democratic rights," for "strengthening judicial protection of human rights," and for "guaranteeing citizens' rights and freedoms in accordance with the law," defining this as of paramount importance to the system restructuring and the safeguard of social fairness and justice. To sum up, the call for respecting and protecting human rights has come to be embraced in every aspect of the endeavor to build a socialist harmonious society--- its overall objective, its basic requirement, and its general requirement. The concept of " respect for and protection of human rights" has been taken as an important cornerstone for the building of a socialist harmonious society.

  On the basis of a review of the latest developments in China's human rights cause and the Party's new experiences in promoting this cause, the 17th CPC Congress in October 2007 made a historical revision to the Constitution of the Communist Party of China by enshrining into it the principle "respect for and protection of human rights." The revised CPC Constitution stresses "respect for and protection of human rights," and calls for effort to "ensure the right of all members of society to equal participation and development." This epitomizes a further recognition of the right of all citizens to human rights and the status of the people as masters of the country. Also epitomized is the central role played by the principle of equality in protection of human rights and the role of fundamental importance protection of human rights assumes under the rule of law. This revision to the CPC Constitution falls in step with contemporary China's on-going drive for development in a scientific way and for social harmony. It points the way out for an all-round development of the country's human rights cause. In short, "respect for and protection of human rights" has become an important philosophy, a guideline, for the Party in running the country in the current phase of the new era.

  "Respect for and protection of human rights" has been enshrined in China's Constitution, thus becoming a principle of paramount importance under the country's fundamental law.

   On proposal of the CPC Central Committee, the Second Session of the 10th NPC in March 2004 approved a bill for revision of the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China. Thanks to the revision, the concept of "human rights" was, for the first time, written down into the Constitution. The revised Constitution provides that "the state shall respect and protect human rights," highlighting the nature of the Constitution as the declaration for protection of popular rights and the pledge by the state to protect such rights. "Respect for and protection of human rights," while the Party's philosophy for running the country, has become a constitutional principle. This shows the Party's philosophy is consistent with the will of the state and the aspiration of the people, which is the essential requirement of the socialist system. The revision to the Constitution enables human rights to occupy a conspicuous position in China’s legal system and national construction. It integrates the three constitutional principles--- people's democracy, rule of law and respect for and protection of human rights--- into an organic whole, thus resulting in an improvement in the basic principle of people's constitutional democracy and ushering in a new era for protection of human rights under rule of law.

  The principle of "respect for and protection of human rights" has, for the first time, been incorporated into the state planning for economic development and social progress, thus becoming an important theme for China's modernization drive.

  On proposal of the CPC Central Committee, the 4th Session of the 10th National People's Congress held in March 2006 adopted the Eleventh Outline Plan for National Economic and Social Development of the People’s Republic of China. While the blue print and action plan for China's economic development and social progress for the 2006-2010 period, the Eleventh Five-Year Plan calls for in explicit language “respecting and protecting human rights and promoting an all-round development of China's human rights cause." For the first time, the concept of human rights was written down into a strategic plan for national development and made a priority in government work. Also for the first time, the human rights cause was defined as an important part of China's modernization endeavor. It is clear that "respect for and protection of human rights" has become an important theme of China's endeavor for national construction and social progress, an important part of the national drive for modernization.

II. Expanded democracy and improved restraint and oversight over powers have brought in more tangible political rights for citizens.

   China has, over the past five years, continued to uphold a road of political development with Chinese characteristics that calls for expanding democracy to improve its political system, with the stress on developing an institutional guarantee for democracy in the political life of the Party and state and also for the status of the people as masters of the country. Democracy has become increasingly institutionalized and standardized under improved procedures. It now assumes increasingly diverse forms. The right of citizens to orderly involvement in politics has been expanded constantly, and their right to know, participate, express and oversee has become effectively guaranteed.

   First of all, we have seen a constant expansion of the citizens's right to orderly involvement in politics. The election system has been improved further, and the election procedures have become standardized, resulting in a gradual expansion of the citizens' right to election and to be elected. There has also been a constant development in China's people's  congress system. Elections of new people's congresses at the county and township levels, which began in 2006, have turned out to be unprecedented in scale. About 600 million voters have cast their votes in the direct elections, highlighting China's people's democracy in a most remarkable way. In 2005, the 3rd Session of the 10th NPC adopted use of mechanical means of voting to ensure secret ballot for resolutions, elections and decisions, making it clear that deputies to the NPC would no longer have to fill in a ballot paper as in the past whether they stand for or against a bill or prefer to abstain from voting. As a result, the right of the NPC deputy has become better protected. In 2007, the 5th Session of the 10th NPC adopted a decision on the number of deputies to the 11th NPC and also on other matters concerning the forthcoming election to choose deputies to the next NPC. For the first time, the decision made it clear that in provinces and municipalities with a relatively large concentration of migrant workers from the countryside, there shall be NPC deputies chosen from among them. The decision is a milestone for the development of Chinese democracy as it comes as a legal guarantee for direct representation of the 100 million migrant workers in China's supreme organ of state power. The report to the 17th CPC National Congress proposed that both urban and rural areas gradually adopt the same ratio of deputies to the represented population in elections of deputies to people’s congresses. Rural citizens account for a majority of the Chinese population, and the proposal is of both historical and practical significance to protection of their right to equality for involvement in politics.

   The system of multiparty cooperation and political consultation under the leadership of the CPC has played an increasingly great role in promoting political consultation between communists and non-communists and democratic oversight by non-communists over the CPC and their participation in discussion and management of state affairs. The current people's congresses at all levels altogether have 180,000 non-communist deputies, and 340,000 non-communists are members of national and local committees of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the country's highest consulting body. The various ministries, the Supreme People's  Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate have 19 non-communists working in their leading bodies. Non-communist officials at the county and higher levels number 32,000 across the country. In 2007, Chen Zhu, a scientist without political party affiliation, was made minister of health and Wan Gang, chairman of the China Zhi Gong Party, minister of science and technology. Chen and Wan are the first two non-communists appointed to ministerial posts since China adopted the state policy of reform and opening to the outside world in the late 1970s. Their appointments come as one more example of how the system of multiparty cooperation and political consultation works in the country's highest administrative organs.

   Grassroots democracy becomes a reality through democratic elections, democratic decision-making, democratic management and democratic oversight, which makes it possible for the broad masses of people to directly exercise their right to manage public affairs and public welfare undertakings. Until now, 28 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions on the Chinese mainland have published rules for implementation of the Organic Law for Villagers’s Committees along with complete sets of specific methods for election of villagers' committees. By the end of 2004, villagers' committees had been set up in 644,000 rural villages, and there were 71,000 residents?committees in cities. Villagers's committees and residents's committees are organs of self-governance by the people. Workers at 1.732 million enterprises and institutions had organized themselves into trade unions, and management affairs had been made open to employees in 316,000 factories and mines. By the end of November 2006, congresses of employees' representatives had been instituted in 495,000 enterprises and institutions.

  Secondly, we have seen a steady increase in involvement of the people in decision-making, and the people's right to political expression has been enhanced.

   Soliciting public opinions on draft laws that concern immediate interests of the people is becoming a routine for the NPC and the NPC Standing Committee. On September 27, 2005, the NPC Standing Committee called a public hearing on the part of wages and salaries to be exempted from the personal income tax as called for by the Income Tax Law. Participants at the public hearing included representatives of concerned government departments and representatives of ordinary citizens. The public hearing, the first ever called by China's supreme organ of state power, represented a breakthrough in China's effort to promote openness in lawmaking. On March 20, 2006, a draft Labor Contract Law was published to solicit opinions and suggestions from people of all walks of life. In just one month, the NPC received 200,000 pieces of feedback, and of these, 65% were from ordinary laboring people. The law was adopted after revisions were made to the draft by taking into full account the opinions and suggestions contributed by citizens. Another example is the Property Law, which concerns the country's basic economic system and the immediate interests of the entire Chinese people. The draft Property Law was published and public hearings were held on it to solicit opinions and suggestions. Moreover, it took 14 long years of controversy and a record eight readings to bring the draft law to vote at the 4th Session of the 10th NPC in March 2005. Beginning December 2002, the NPC Standing Committee called more than 100 meetings on how to revise the draft--- also a record. According to analysis by experts of law, a vast majority of the Chinese laws had at least one third of the articles revised or readjusted before they were enacted. In some laws, articles revised or readjusted account for more than half of the total.

   The Government has become even more democratic in making decisions. In 2005, the State Council made it a rule that for a decision of major importance to be finalized, study by and consultation from experts in the related fields shall be a must, and it must also go through assessment by an independent intermediate agency along with a law review by legal professionals. On November 30, 2006, Zhang Zhansheng, the Party secretary of a rural village in Shanxi Province, was able to chat with Premier Wen Jiabao on what he thought of the Party's policies toward agriculture, and rural population and rural areas. The meeting took place in the Premier's office at Zhongnanhai, home to the CPC Central Committee and China's central government. Like the Shanxi farmer, numerous scholars, experts and entrepreneurs have been invited to Zhongnanhai over the past year to contribute opinions and suggestions on matters concerning national development and people's livelihood, including the formulation of the country's  Eleventh Five-Year Plan for Economic and Social Development (2006-2010). According to statistics provided by competent authorities, governments of more than 70%of the cities and counties on the Chinese mainland have published rules and regulations concerning democratic decision-making, including institutionalized public hearings for the making of major and important decisions.

  Thirdly, the right of the general public to know and oversee has been promoted constantly. Operations of people's congresses have become increasingly transparent, and so has been the performance by their deputies of their duties. Each of the annual sessions of the 10th NPC, from the first session to the 5th, featured a higher degree of transparency than the previous one. The 2003 NPC session made history by attracting an all-time more than 3,000 reporters, including 500 foreign reporters. Moreover, more and more meetings held by various delegations were open to the press. An Internet "press center" was started by the 2006 NPC session--- also something new. Before the opening of the 2007 NPC session, where each and every of the delegations was seated had already been made known to the press. This was new. Also new was that members of foreign press corps were allowed to direct contact deputies for interviews. The telephone numbers of the delegations's liaison officers to facilitate such contacts. Moreover, English translations of introductions to important draft laws were made available to the foreign press. In short, never had a previous NPC session been so open and transparent.  

  The exercise of administrative powers, too, has become increasingly transparent. Twenty years ago, openness of public financial accounting at the village level was written into the Organic Law for Villagers’ Committees. Since then, openness of government affairs has become an important part of China's effort to develop democracy and rule by law. The CPC Central Committee has time again called for openness of government affairs. As a result, progress has been accelerating in an effort to realize such openness. Outlets for release of government information have become increasingly diversified and service-oriented. There are provisions on information release in more than 80 laws and government regulations, including the Legislation Law and the Regulations on the Handling of Public Health Emergencies. Working departments of the State Council and organizations operating immediately under them, 55 in total, have set up leading groups in charge of work related to openness of those government affairs for which they are responsible. These leading groups all have a permanent staff. Moreover, normative documents on openness of government affairs have been worked out by 45 central state organs, the governments of all the 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities on the Chinese mainland and the headquarters of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. These documents all have provisions on release of information on government or administrative affairs. Press briefings by spokespersons have become an institutional practice of 74 central state organs and the governments of the 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities. Virtually all county and township (rural town) governments, as well as working departments of county governments, are now releasing on a regular basis information about their work on boards specially published for the purpose. Moreover, government bulletins are issued regularly by governments at the county and higher levels. Up to now, 19 central state organs and the governments of 14 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities have made public a catalogue of items open for public scrutiny. There are 2,100 one-stop administrative service centers operating across the country. Openness of public affairs has become a reality in 95% of China's 644,000 rural villages. Management affairs have been made transparent in 531,000 factories and mines. What merits special mention is the fact that openness of management affairs is now a reality in 95% of the state- and collectively-owned enterprises and also in enterprises of which they are the holding parties.

   According to China's Regulations Concerning the Release of Government Information published by the State Council in the first half of 2007, openness of government information shall be the guiding principle while withholding of it shall be possible only on exceptional occasions. The Regulations provides, in explicit language, the scope and subjects for the release of government information, along with the relevant forms and procedures and the ways of oversight and safeguard. It aims to let the people know the limit of administrative powers, the procedures for the exercise of such powers, the expected results of government work and the ways of overseeing the governments in their work. This is meant to institutionalize the effort to curb abuse of powers and tackle the problem from its root, also to safeguard the people's right to know, to get involved in government work and to oversee the government, indicating that the Chinese Government has embarked on the road leading to the era of information openness. On January 1, 2006, China's  central government kicked off its website, www.gov.cn, allowing the State Council and its working departments and the provincial, autonomous regional and municipal governments to release their administrative information while offering online services. The website is now dubbed "government working non-stop." By June 2006, the number has grown to some 12,000 for government websites using the realm name "gov.cn." Moreover, 75 central state organs, the 31 provincial-level governments, 96% of the governments at the prefecture-city level and 77% of the county governments had set up their own websites. Most government websites offer public services, thus playing a big role in promoting openness of government work and protecting the people's democratic rights. At the end of September 2007, the key part of the state electronic administrative network was officially put into operation. This is a public platform serving the needs of administrative information sharing by central government organs and local governments at various levels. Meanwhile, freedom of citizens to acquire and dissemination information has been expanded. By the first half of 2007, the Chinese Internet population had grown to 162 million, from 59.1 million in 2002, representing an annual average increase of 31.7%. China now has the second largest Internet population in the world, next only to the United States. The country now has 1.32 million websites, averaging ten for every 10,000 people.

  Fourthly, the mechanism for power restraint and oversight has been strengthened to better protect the people's lawful rights and interests from being infringed upon. On August 27, 2006, the Supervision Law of Standing Committees of People’s Congresses at Various Levels was enacted to normalize the power of supervision enjoyed by the national and local legislatures over work of the State Council, the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate. It took 20 years of deliberation for the law to be brought to vote, longer than any other law. The law's adoption suggests that supervision by organs of state power over administrative and judicial organs has become an institutional practice under the rule by law, which is of great significance to the national endeavor to promote and ensure administrative and judicial justice, prevent abuse and misuse of official powers and protect human rights. At present, steps are being taken to improve the country's power structure in which the decision-making, executive and supervisory powers constrain while coordinating with one another. Progressing hand-in-hand is the building of an operational mechanism for this power structure, whereby legislative safeguard is ensured, powers are bound with responsibilities, use of power is subject to supervision and oversight, acts in violation of law are investigated and prosecuted, and indemnities are a must for infringements of rights.

  Further progress has been made in strengthening the normalization and restraint of administrative powers. In March 2004, the State Council published the Outline Program for Pushing Administration by Law, pledging to the world to build a government under the rule by law in ten years. Over the past three years since then, China's administrative legislation has improved steadily. By June 2007, the State Council had submitted to the NPC 29 legal bills for deliberation and approval, and had also drawn or revised 122 sets of regulations. More than 90% of the city governments and more than 80% of the governments at the county and higher levels have by now institutionalized the practice of putting normative documents on the record to facilitate reviews by the governments of the next higher level. As a result, a mechanism is taking shape whereby the central and local governments are able to examine the normative documents from lower-level governments under their respective jurisdiction. In 2006, the 31 provincial-level governments received 9,071 normative documents from their own working departments and the city-level governments they govern. Of these, 515 were amended for problems found by the provincial-level governments through review and examination. Governments at the city and county levels received 50,623 normative documents from lower-level governments, of which 1,070 were found problematic and were amended. The Administrative Penalties Law, which was promulgated in 1996, has effectively curbed irregularities in imposing administrative penalties. This, plus the Administrative Permit Law that became effective on July 1, 2004, has ushered in a self-revolution of China’s government establishment. In just a few years, the governments of the 31 mainland provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities and 44 State Council working departments have examined more than 1.63 million local administrative rules and regulations. The central authorities alone have revoked or readjusted more than 1,800 matters subject to administrative examination, and such matters revoked or readjusted by provincial-level government corresponding exceed 22,000 in number. Both figures account for more than half of the totals under the respective jurisdiction of the central and provincial-level governments. Again in October 2007, the State Council decided to revoke 186 matters formerly subject to administrative examination.

   Acts of administration are becoming increasingly service-oriented. The central government has abolished those old methods that were in practice for many years, calling for rounding up and deporting beggars and vagrants from cities. In practice now is a set of new methods for assisting beggars and vagrants without means of living. The new methods are filled with human touch, embodying a humanistic concern, as assistance is given on the basis of the free will of potential recipients. By the end of 2006, the 1,189 assistance centers across China had given help to 1.296 million people in need. Public security authorities have improved their work by taking a range of measures to make things easier for citizens in matters that concern their vital interests such as household registration, traffic management, fire protection and entry-exit control. Meanwhile, work has been continuing to ensure that cases handled by the police are in strict accordance with the legally prescribed procedures. Acts of the police in violation of law and discipline, such as extorting confession by torture, illegal use of weapons and abuse of coercive measures, are now resolutely prosecuted. All this has won public acclaim all over the country.

   Supervision has become increasingly stringent over the operation of government powers. Thirty provincial-level governments and 34 working organs of the State Council have published a list of matters under their respective administration. Twenty-three provincial governments, as well as ten State Council working departments that have a relatively heavy task of law enforcement, have set for themselves quantified norms for assessing the performance by their officials of their respective duties. Some 70% of the city and county governments have formulated normative rules and regulations special for the making of administrative decisions, with painstaking attention paid to curbing abuse and misuse of official powers. Work has been strengthened with regard to administrative reviews and supervision over specific administrative acts. In the most recent years, administrative reviews have been conducted on some 80,000 administrative disputes annually, and 80% of the disputes have been properly resolved. In a related development, work has been progressing to institutionalize the practice of obliging erring officials to take the blame on themselves and resign while having them investigated to affix their responsibilities. In recent years, officials blamed for major emergencies have all been punished--- those for the spread the SARS epidemic in 2003; those of the China National Petroleum Corporation for a disastrous natural gas blowout that happened the same year at Kaixian County, Sichuan Province; those for a fire in 2004 that caused many deaths at the Zhongbai Department Store in Jilin City, Jinlin Province, in 2004; those for chemical contamination of the Songhua River in northeast China in 2005; and those for a slave labor scandal at some unlicensed brickworks that was exposed in 2007. Just in 2006, 90,000 officials across China were investigated for errors committed in enforcement of laws.

III. Protection of human rights through legislation, enforcement of law and administration of justice has become stronger under rule by law.

   Over the past five years, the Party and Government have continued to uphold the principle of running the country in accordance with the law and accelerated the pace of work to realize rule by law in China, seeing to it that the principle of "respect for and protection of human rights" is carried to the letter in every link in legislation, law enforcement and administration of justice.

  First of all, we have witnessed a constant improvement in the system of legal protection for human rights. The principle of respecting and protecting human rights is enshrined in the 2004 revised Constitution. The revised Constitution has improved provisions on expropriation of land and on protection of lawful private property. It has new provisions on development of a social insurance system. Moreover, the revised Constitution uses the world "emergency" to replaced "curfew" in the old Constitution, thus perfecting the legal mechanisms for handling emergencies while enriching the constitutional connotation with regard to protection of human rights. The NPC and NPC Standing Committee have since 2002 adopted many laws and legal interpretations and decisions in connection with human rights protection and humanistic concern, averaging several dozen a year. A string of new laws epitomize the spirit of serving the people and making things easier for them. These include the Supervision Law, Law on Residents’ ID Cards, Administrative Licensing Law, Employment Promotion Law, Road Safety Law, Law on Emergency Management and Preventive Law on Radioactive Pollution. Protection has become stronger for people of vulnerable groups thanks to the newly revised Compulsory Education Law, Law on Protection of Women’s Rights and Interests, and Law on the Protection of Minors. In compliance with public demand, the principle of "respecting and protecting human rights and respecting citizens" personal dignity" was written down into the Penalty Law of Public Security Management and a new chapter on enforcement supervision was added to the final draft. The Labor Contract Law provides still better protection for laborers' lawful rights and interests. The Property Law has detailed provisions on citizens’ right to lawful private property. The Agriculture Law has a chapter entitled "Protection of Farmers' Rights and Interests".

   The NPC and NPC Standing Committee have over the past ten years made or enacted 188 laws and adopted 82 legal interpretations and decisions. Of all these, 60 were made or revised in the most recent five years. From 2003 to June 2006, the State Council formulated and revised 122 administrative regulations. Currently, China has 220 laws in force along with more than 600 administrative regulations of the State Council which, with the Constitution at the core, form a fairly complete legal system for safeguard of human rights.

   Secondly, protection of human rights has been strengthened thanks to effort to reform the system of criminal justice administration.

   Thanks to strengthened legal supervision over execution of punishment, extended custody, which used to be a long-standing, repeatedly occurring problem, has been effectively curbed. In 2003, the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate and the Ministry of Public Security jointly launched a nationwide campaign to address the problem. Thanks to this, the number of victims of extended custody has been reduced from 24,921 to 43 now. Moreover, initial success has been made in developing a long-term mechanism for prevention of extended custody, with a view to effectively protecting the legitimate rights and interests of criminal suspects and the accused in criminal cases.

   Judicial organs have done a good job of investigating infringements on human rights through abuse of official powers. In 2006, 33,668 cases of corruption, bribery, dereliction of duty and other alleged job-related offenses were placed on file for investigation and prosecution. Of the 40,041 suspects, 29,966 were prosecuted at the end of the examinations of their cases. Moreover, 930 civil officials were prosecuted allegedly for infringements upon citizens?personal or democratic rights by abusing their powers, such as illegal custody and torture to extort confession. Prison administration has been improved, and the lawful rights and interests of prison inmates are now better protected, resulting in fewer escapes and offenses committed by inmates during imprisonment. Community-based correction for convicts has been experimented in 25 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities, and only 0.21% of the convicts have committed offenses again while serving their terms outside prison, under the surveillance of people in their own communities. Cases of education-through-labor are now subject to more stringent examinations. A series of measures have been taken to reform the education-through-labor system. People likely to be penalized are now allowed to have lawyers to speak in their defense and they have the right to demand review of the decisions on their cases.

   On October 31, 2006, the NPC Standing Committee adopted a decision on revising the Organic Law of People's Courts, allowing the Supreme People's Court to withdraw, beginning January 1, 2007, from provincial-level courts the power to review death sentences. This was meant to ensure painstakingly controlled use of death penalty, a most important reform in the use of capital punishment under the principle that calls for protection of human rights while punishing crimes. The number of executions has kept dropping over the past decades, to a record low in 2006. The number of executions carried out so far this year is considerably lower than for the corresponding period of the previous year, thanks to withdrawal by the Supreme People's Court of the power to review death sentences.  Besides, death sentences rejected by the Supreme People's Court after review account for a fairly big proportion of the total.

   Thirdly, work has been done to improve the system of judicial openness and enhance the restraint and oversight of judicial powers, focusing on resolving those conspicuous problems that are affecting judicial justice, with a view to effectively protecting the lawful rights and interests of citizens.

  People's courts across the country have taken further steps to ensure that trials are open to the public under the principle of "timely, all-round openness of adjudication in accordance with the law." The scope of trial jurisdiction has been expanded, and so has been the content of adjudication. People’s courts have been working in real earnest to fulfill the obligation of informing the litigants of the conditions for accepting a case, the legal documents to be supplied and the court cost to be incurred, while making the progress of trials known to the public through an inquiry mechanism. The people's assessor system has undergone further improvements. By the end of 2006, 55,681 people's assessors had been chosen through election or appointment. From May 2005 to June 2006, people's assessors attended trials of 644,700 cases, averaging 13.82 for each, accounting for more than one fifth of the ordinary procedure cases tried during the period. More than 80% of the cases involving people's assessors in trials have closed with mediation, mostly to the satisfaction of the contending litigants.

   Procuratorial organs have strengthened their legal supervision over adjudication activities to ensure judicial justice. In 2006, 16,662 cases were placed on file for investigation on request of procuratorial organs. Also in 2006, procuratorial organs ordered arrests of an additional 14,858 persons and prosecution of an additional 10,703 persons. Meanwhile, they decided not to approve the arrests of 96,382 persons and the prosecution of 7,204 persons. Procuratorial organs also demanded corrections in the handling of cases that involved 2,846 persons---cases of commutation, parole and execution of jail sentences outside prison. They also demanded corrections of illegal acts in investigations of 11,368 cases. Thanks to intervention of procuratorial organs, corrections were made to extended custody of 233 persons. Simultaneous sound and video recording is being institutionalized by procuratorial organs for questioning of suspects in offenses committed by taking advantage of their official positions. Up to now, this has become true at 2,171 people's procuratorates. Moreover, 86% of the people's procuratorates are piloting a new system of having their work overseen by the people. These together now have 21,962 "supervisors" chosen from among citizens.

   Fourthly, judicial reparation has been improved to the benefit of citizens belonging to the underprivileged groups. The court costs have been cut by 60%, with reductions made by people's courts across the country amounting to 8 billion yuan a year. From May 2005 to September 2006, judicial reparation was provided to nearly 40,000 litigants in financial difficulties, with the combined sum amounting to 2.26 billion yuan for exemption, deduction and respite of court costs. In 2006, legal assistance institutions under organs of judicial administration handled 318,500 requests for legal assistance and received 3.194 million visits for inquiries, 256% and 19.9% greater than the corresponding figures for the previous year. Recipients of legal assistance included 125,200 migrant workers from the countryside. Positive efforts are being made to institutionalize state compensations for victims in criminal cases and their families.

IV. Rapid, sound national development ensures better protection of the people's right to subsistence and development.

  Over the past five years, China has spared no effort to increase social wealth and improve people's livelihood, resulting in better protection of the people's right to subsistence and development.

   The national strength has increased remarkably over the years. The most recent five years have featured a most rapid economic growth in China's history. From 2002 to 2006, China achieved double-digit economic growths year after year. For the first half of 2007, the rate of economic growth was computed at 11.5%, much higher than the global average of 4.9%. In 2006, China's GDP (gross domestic product) exceeded 2.1 trillion yuan, double that for 2002 and 310.6 times that for 1952. The 2006 figure suggests that compared with 2002, the portion of China's 2006 economy in the global economy increased by 1.1 percentage points. China had, by 2006, become the fourth greatest economy in the world, moving upward from the sixth in 2002. The combined volume of China's imports and exports came to US$1.7606 trillion, up from US$620.7 billion for 2002, an annual average increase of 29.8%, suggesting that China had become the third greatest trading power in the world, up from the fifth place it occupied four years ago. China's 2006 GDP averaged US$2,010 per capita, up from US$1,100 in 2002, suggesting that China is now becoming a medium-income country.

   Increasing prosperity has been ensured for a vast majority of the Chinese population. During the 2002-2006 period, the net income for rural residents increased from 2,476 yuan per person to 3,587 yuan per person, representing an annual increase of 6.2% on an average. Farmers?incomes in cash reached 2,111 yuan per person in the first half of 2007, a real increase of 13.3% over the first half of 2006. The disposable incomes of urban residents increased from 7,703 yuan in 2002 to 11,759 yuan in 2006, a nominal increase of 52.7% or an annual average increase of 9.2% in real terms. The disposable incomes for China's urban residents averaged 7,052 yuan per capita for the first half of 2007, a 14.1% real increase year-on-year. At the end of June 2007, savings deposits in banks made by China’s urban and rural residents had 16.95 trillion yuan in balance, 8 trillion yuan more than at the end of 2004. The 2002 balance of bank savings deposits averaged 6,766 yuan for each member of the Chinese population. In comparison, the 2006 figure was 12,239 yuan, an increase of 1,381 yuan on an average for each of the four years. More areas of investment are now available to the Chinese people, including for example stock markets and various funds.

   The quality of people's life has kept improving. In 2006, each Chinese spent 6,111 yuan on an average, 76 times as much as in 1952 (80 yuan) and 33 times the 1978 figure (184 yuan). Consumer spending averaged 8,697 yuan for each member of the urban population in 2006, 44.2% over 2002. The 2006 living expenses averaged 2,829 yuan per capita for the rural population, 54.2% greater than the 2002 figure. For China's urban residents, the Engle coefficient (the cost of food in proportion to the total consumer spending) dropped by 1.9 percentage points from 2002 to 2006, from 37.7% to 35.8%. For the rural residents, the drop was 3.2 percentage points, from 46.2%t to 43%. Calculated on a per capita basis, housing space available to each urban resident averaged 27 square meters in 2006, up from 22.8 square meters in 2002. For rural residents, it increased from 26.6 square meters to 30.7 square meters.

   Living conditions, too, have improved significantly. Residents have been spending more and more on items of self-development and personal enjoyment such as transport, communications, cultural activities, education, entertainment, household services, health care and travels. Private ownership of cars is no longer rare. Of the 49.85 million civil vehicles in use at the end of 2006, 29.25 million were private cars. On an average, there were 4.3 cars for every 100 urban households in 2006, compared with 0.9 in 2002. During the same 2002-2006 period, the number of motorcycles increased from 28.1 to 44.6 for every 100 rural households. The number of subscribers to fixed- and mobile telephone services increased from 420 million to 829 million. There were, on an average, 63.4 telephone sets in use in 2006 for every 100 persons, up from 33.7 at the end of 2002. Included were handsets whose number, divided by 100, grew from 16.2 to 35.3, suggesting handset services had become affordable for most working people. By the end of June 2007, the number of subscribers to handset services had exceeded 500 million--- one handset for every three Chinese. Included were 44.3 million people who had their handsets linked to the Internet, 2.6 times the figure for a year ago. Tourism is becoming a common way of recreation for the Chinese people. In 2006, 1.39 billion domestic tours were recorded, 15% over 2005. The year's domestic tourist revenue came to 623 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 17.9%. Some 34.52 million Chinese left China for overseas, 11.3% more than in 2005. Of these, 28.8 million (83.4%) were on private tours, a year-on-year increase of 83.4%.

   The number of poverty-stricken citizens has continued to dwindle over the past five years. While striving to ensure improvements in the livelihood of the entire population, the Chinese Government has worked even harder to resolve problems in the life of the poverty-stricken population. The number of rural people in absolute poverty--- those unable to earn enough to feed and clothe themselves--- dropped from 250 million in 1978 to 21.48 million in 2006, meaning that during those 28 years, 228 million people were freed from absolute poverty. In 1978, the country's  absolute poverty rate was computed at 30.7%. By 2006, it had dropped to 2.3%. China now stands out as the only country to have met the U.N. millennium development goal of halving absolute poverty. Just for one thing: those Chinese freed from poverty during the 1990-2006 period accounted for 70% of the global population in poverty. According to the World Bank, the world’s poverty-stricken population would have kept increasing had China not contributed to the global drive for poverty alleviation. From 2002 to the end of 2006, the number of the low-income Chinese dropped from 62.13 million to 33.5 million. During the same period, the proportion of low-income people to the total rural population dropped from 6.7% to 3.7%.

V. Improve livelihood and safeguard social justice to enable people to enjoy equally their economic, social and cultural rights.

   Over the past five years, China's reform and development has been marked with following characteristics: Placing social construction that concerns the national economy and people's livelihood and social justice in the prominent place and making great efforts to raise the abilities of ensuring the basic public service and the supply of public good, with focus put on solving the problems that concern the direct and practical interests of the people and the people are the most concerned about and on the overall development of all areas. As a result, marked progress has been made to enable all the people to receive an education, all labors to get their income due, all patients to get access to medical treatment, the aged to be taken good care of and all the people to have their houses to live in.

  Firstly, the rights of urban and rural laborers are equally and better protected. Employment is fundamental to the people's livelihood. Since 2002, the state has promulgated a series of laws and regulations, including the Labor Contract Law, Employment Promotion Law, Safe Production Law, Work-related Injury Insurance Regulations and the Labor Protection and Supervision Regulations that have enriched the laws for protecting the rights of laborers. The state has put the expansion of employment in the prominent place in economic and social development and focused its efforts on establishing and improving the responsibility system for promoting employment, standardizing human resources market, the job training and education system, public employment service system, equal employment system and the system for the relief of difficult workers, thus putting the rights to labor of the citizens under better protection. Thanks to the government efforts to promote employment and re-employment, the average newly added employment reached nearly 10 million in 2003~2006 and the urban registered unemployment rate has been kept at below 4.3%. Since 1998, the more than 24 million workers laid off by state-owned enterprises have enjoyed their minimum cost of living. Among them, nearly 20 million have been re-employed. This has solved the problem of re-employment of workers laid off due to system transition and readjustment of structure. By the end of 2007, over 80% of the difficult families had solved their employment problem. In 2006, the employed people accounted for 58.1% of the total population of the year, 22.1 percentage points higher than in 1952. The average per capita money wages of all employed reached 21,000 yuan, 46.2 times that of 1952.

   The system of equal employment of both urban and rural laborers has been put in place step by step. The state has adopted effective measures to strength skill training of rural laborers, banned the discriminatory rules and unreasonable restrictions that barred the surplus farmers from entering into cities so as to allow farmers to get jobs on an equal footing with their urban peers. The state has also made efforts to solve the problem of children of farmer workers going to school and improve their production and living conditions to safeguard the rights and interests of farmer workers. The state has also launched a nationwide action of safeguarding the rights and interests of farmer workers, including the overall solution to the problems of wage in arrears and harsh working conditions of farmer workers to ensure that farmer workers get their pay on time and in full. At the same time, the state has taken steps to improve the system of reporting the wage payment monitoring, wage guarantee money and wage in arrears, which has effectively curtailed and prevented the recurrence of back payment. Up to before the Spring Festival of 2005, all the 33.7 billion yuan of wage in arrears had been paid off. By the end of January 2007, 183.4 billion yuan of project funds that had not been paid before 2003 had been paid, accounting for 98.6% of the total left over from the past. Incomplete figures from 27 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities, from the fourth quarter of 2006 to the first half of 2007, a general check of wage payment was carried out, helping 1.5 million farmer workers retrieve 1.735 billion yuan of wages in arrears. The state has also strengthened supervision and law enforcement concerning labor protection. In 2007, the state organized a general check and punished public service personnel of administrative organs involving in the slave labor scandal at some unlicensed brickworks in Shanxi Province. This was followed by a nationwide drive to check the labor employment problems. All the actions have helped bring the lawful rights and interests of laborers under good protection. In addition, the state has launched a nationwide action to put the labor market in order, uncovering and punishing 15,000 law violation cases and banning 6,522 illegal intermediary organizations. The labor-intensive enterprises and units in between urban and rural areas are the main targets of check up in labor employment. The state ordered employing units to sign labor contracts with 1.105 million laborers and pay 360 million yuan of wages in arrears to 406,000 laborers and pay retrospectively 504 million yuan of social insurance fees.

  The state has paid particular attention to safeguarding the rights to production and livelihood of farmers. Since 2004, the central authorities issued four No. 1 documents in succession, producing a series of heavy-weight policies and measures of paying attention to and benefiting farmers. In 2006, the state abrogated the agricultural specialty tax, livestock breeding tax, agricultural tax and slaughter tax, ending the history of farmers paying taxes for tilling the land that had lasted for more than 2,600 years. Compared with that before the tax removal, the tax exemption move lightened the burdens of farmers amounting to about 125 billion yuan a year since 2006. Since 2004, the state has produced all kinds of subsidies including that for grain growers. In 2007, the central finance arranged 52.6 billion yuan of direct subsidies to grain and other farm production. The actual expenditure in agriculture, rural areas and farmers by the central finance has been increasing year by year. Such expenditure in 2007 reached 391.7 billion yuan, 15.3% more than in the previous year. Besides, the state has launched special programs to exempt and cut fees due to be paid by farmers. This has reduced the burdens of farmers by 60.638 billion yuan. These measures have stimulated the development of the rural areas and agriculture and has gone a long way to improving the living standards of the rural people. The total grain production in 2006 reached 994.9 billion tons, achieving for the first time stable growth for three years in a row since 1985. In 2006, the per capita net income of the rural areas rose by 7.4% in real terms over that of the previous year. That was also the first time to increase over 6% for three successive years since 1985. In the first half of 2007, the per capita cash income of farmers reached 2,111 yuan, 13.3% more than in the same period of 2006, the fastest growth since 1995. The state is firm to correct the problem of encroaching upon the lawful rights and interests of farmers in land requisition. Since 2002, the country had cleared 17.546 billion yuan of land compensation fees in arrears.

  Secondly, the rights of urban and rural residents to social security and material aid are well protected. The state has accelerated the pace of building up the social security system that covers both urban and rural areas in order to enable the people to benefit more from the social security net and social relief system. The coverage of urban social insurance has been expanded step by step. By the end of 2006, 187.66 million people were covered by the old-age insurance scheme, 40.29 million more than in 2002; 157.32 million were covered by medical insurance, 63.31 million more than in 2002; 111.87 million were covered by unemployment insurance, 10.05 million more than in 2002; 102.68 people were covered by work-related injury insurance, 56.82 million more than in 2002; and 64.59 people were covered by birth insurance, 29.71 million more than in 2002. This shows an annual upward trend. By the end of June 2007, the number of farmer workers covered by work-related injury insurance reached 30.62 million and those covered by medical insurance reached 26.88 million, 5.25 million and 3.26 million more than at the end of last year. In the rural areas, 53.74 million people have been covered by old-age pension insurance and the premiums accumulated have come to 35.4 billion. The old-age pension standards have been raised for years in succession, benefiting 42 million workers retiring from enterprises. From 1998 to 2006, the old-age pension for retired workers disbursed increased from 151.2 billion to 489.7 billion. In 2002, the basic old-age pension averaged 615 yuan per person. But the figure reached 963 yuan by 2007. The state will raise the standards again from 2008 to 2010 and the average monthly amount per person will exceed 1,200 yuan.

   In order to ensure the minimum cost of living for the poor population, the state has in recent years established a social relief system that covers both urban and rural areas, including urban and rural minimum cost living program, the temporary relief for victims of natural disasters, urban and rural medical relief system, the rural "five guarantees" (guarantee for food, clothing, medical care, housing and burial expenses for the aged, the infirm, old widows and widowers and orphans) and the relief for vagrants and beggars as well as medical, education and housing relief systems and legal aid system. At present, 150 million people have received reliefs of different types. The minimum cost of living program that covers all those entitled to was realized in 2002. Since then, the state’s input has increased year by year in a bid to ensure the level of coverage to rise. Statistics shows that the input by finances at all levels increased from 2.7 billion yuan in 2000 to 22.4 billion by 2006, with the number of people covered by the minimum cost of living program kept at about 22 million in five year running. In 2006, 22.41 million urban residents were covered by the minimum cost of living program, with the standards rising from 149 yuan per person per month in 2003 to 177 yuan. In the meanwhile, the program started in the rural areas in 2007. By the end of June 2007, 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities had launched the program, bringing 25.73 million people under coverage, 10.64 million more than in 2006. The figure is expected to reach 30 million by the end of 2007. At present, the minimum cost of living for the rural areas is 1,032 yuan per person per year. In the country as a whole, 1,249,800 rural people and 856,000 urbanites have benefited from medical relief. The expenses of rural "guarantees" have been provided by local finances instead of local townships, making 5.07 million childless old people and orphans secure in their life. There are 1.871 million beds in all kinds of adoptive welfare units, taking care of 1.47 people, including old people, handicapped and orphans. Cities and towns have established 120,000 community service facilities of all types. In order to ease the problem of housing for low-income families, the state has established a housing insurance system. By the end of 2006, the low-rent housing program had solved the housing problems for 300,000 families covered by minimum cost of living and the low-cost housing program had made housing affordable to more than 16 million low-income families. The public housing accumulation funds have issued 800 billion yuan of housing loans to contributors and more than 40 million workers have improved their housing conditions by drawing from the public accumulation funds or by using loans provided by the fund.

   Thirdly, rights of the people to medical insurance and health have been improved. In order to realize the health for all program and safeguard the rights to health, the state has committed human and financial resources to solve the problem of difficulty and affordability of the people to get access to medical treatment and strive to narrow the gaps between town and country, among different regions and among different income groups. The state has accelerated the pace of establishing a medical and health system conducive for the people to get timely medical treatment and safe use of medicine at reasonable cost in a bid to improve the medical service level. In recent years, the national finance’s commitment to health has increased at an annual average rate of over 20%. In order to solve the problem of the 900 million rural people to get access to treatment, medicine and the problem of falling into poverty due to illness and falling ill due to poverty, the Party Central Committee and the State Council mooted to set up a new type of rural cooperative medical system in October 2002, which mainly features public pool for major diseases and voluntary participation. This is the first time in history for the government to take the lead in establishing a medical insurance system for farmers. From 2003 to 2007, the State Council called four national work conferences to discuss the healthy development of the new type of rural cooperative medical system. By the end of June 30, 2007, the system covered a population of 720 million, 82.83% of the total rural population. The number of counties and districts that have set up such system reached 2,429, 84.87% of the total. It is planned that all the counties and districts of the country will have such medical system ready by 2008. The new type of rural cooperative medical system raised 3.29 billion yuan of funds from 2004 to 2006 and 470 million rural people received medical compensation amounting to 24.39 billion yuan. In the meanwhile, the central finance invested 1.85 billion from 2003 to 2006 to sustain the healthy growth of the rural medical system. This has, to a certain extent, solved the problem of farmers who cannot pay to participate in the cooperative system or who are unable to pay large sums of medical expenses. From 2004 to the 11th Five-Year Program period, the governments at all levels will arrange 21.6 billion yuan to construct and transform the existing county, township and village three-tier medical organizations. By the end of 2006, there were more than 10,000 hospitals at the county level, 40,000 township clinics and more than 600,000 village medical centers. The urban basic medical insurance program has also started in part of the cities as an experiment. It is planned to make the program cover the whole country in a little more than three years. By the end of 2006, there were more than 5,000 community health service centers and nearly 18,000 community health service stations, thus reinforcing the urban public health care networks.

   At present, there are 300,000 health organizations in China, manned by 4.525 million health technicians. Hospital and clinics have a total of 3,216 million beds, closing on the goal of health for all. In 2005, the mean life expectancy at birth reached 72.95 years, two years more than in 2002, not only higher than the 65-year level of developing countries but also higher than the world average of 67 years and only four years less than the average level of 77 years of developed countries.

   Fourthly, rights to enjoy education equally are realized. China has committed more financial and other resources to promoting a comprehensive and balanced development of education and increasing the opportunities for nationals to receive education in a bid to raise the level of education of the nationals in general. The fiscal expenditures in education increased from 61.783 billion yuan in 1991 to 516.108 billion by 2005, rising by more than seven times. With that covered by the national budget reaching 646.1 billion yuan in 2007, 105.3 billion or 17.5% more than in 2006, higher than the growth of the whole fiscal expenditure. The budgeted education expenditure increased by 41.7%. The compulsory education has spread wider. At present, 70% of the increment in the fiscal receipts is used in compulsory education. By the end of 2006, the primary school enrolment rate had reached 99.3%, 0.3 percentage points higher than in 2001. The junior secondary school gross enrolment rate reached 97%, 8.3 percentage points higher than in 2001. In areas that have basically realized the nine-year compulsory education and basically wiped out illiteracy, the population coverage has reached 98%. The population covered by the nine-year compulsory education rose from 91.2% in 2002 to 96% by 2006. The compulsory education completion rate had reached 84.14%. The higher education has basically become popular. In 2006, more than 25 million students received higher education, 12 million more than in 2001, with the gross enrolment rate reaching 22%, 8.7 percentage points higher than in 2001. In 2006, the regular universities and colleges enrolled 5.46 million students, twice as many as in 2001, which was 2.68 million. The number of students at school reached 17.39 million, 11.75 million or 48% more than in 2001. At present, the average years of education received by Chinese population are 10. There are more than 70 million people among the total population, who have had at least university education. The number of people among the people employed who have a higher education is in the front ranks of the world.

   The state has adopted effective policies and measures to allocate education resources rationally to promote equity in education and to ease the difficulty for the common people who find it difficult to go to school or who cannot afford to education.  "No school fees" for students covered by rural compulsory education has become a major milestone in the history of education in China. In 2005, the State Council decided to set up a mechanism to ensure expenses for rural compulsory education so that rural students are totally free from tuitions and students from poor rural families get free textbooks and subsidies to lodging. The program started in the western part of the country in 2006, where about 52 million rural primary and middle school students freed from tuition, with the burdens for each primary school student cut by 140 yuan a year and middle school student, by 180 yuan. About 34 million students from poor families received free textbooks and 7.8 million students from poor families received subsidies to lodging. The central finance has invested 9 billion yuan in three successive years for use to build rural lodging schools, benefiting 7,651 schools. Starting from the spring semester in 2007, the tuition for the whole rural compulsory education stage is free, benefiting nearly 150 million students in more than 400,000 primary and middle schools. The state will increase fiscal education expenditure by 218.2 billion yuan to sustain the rural free compulsory education. In addition, the state has invested 11 billion yuan in the modern remote education program in rural primary and middle schools. Now 80% of the more than 100 million rural primary and middle school students have benefited from the program. The program is expected to cover all the rural primary and middle schools by the end of 2007 so that quality education resources will be shared nationwide.

   In order to ensure that students from financially hard-up families to afford university education, the state has set up a grant-in-aid program, including student loan program. In 2005, the institutions of higher learning in the country aided 14.83 million students with financial difficulties. In order to solve the problem from the roots, the state started in the autumn semester of 2007 to increase financial support for establishing a new grant-in-aid system. In the future, the total amount of fiscal expenditure, student loans and grant-in-aid arranged by schools will reach 50 billion yuan a year. This will be the largest amount and the strongest support from the public finance to education since the founding of New China. This will enable about four million university students and 16 million middle-level vocational school students to receive such aid.

   Fifthly, basic rights and interests of people to culture have been better protected. The state has made cultural undertakings of public welfare nature a main means to protect the basic rights of the people to culture. It has strengthened the community and rural village cultural facilities to make culture flourish. It has made greater efforts to enrich the cultural activities in the rural areas, especially remote areas and among the farmers working in cities to ensure that all people enjoy the fruits of cultural development. Statistics show that by the end of 2006, there were 2,778 public libraries and 1,617 museums in the country. The overall population coverage by radio broadcasting had reached 95% and that by TV broadcasting, 96.2%. The country published 234,000 titles of books, 35.8% more than in 2002, 9,468 titles of periodicals, 4.86% more than in 2002, and 1,938 newspapers, 42.452 billion copies, 15.41% more than in 2002. The number of audio products came to 15,850 titles in 220 million cassettes (discs), 10% more than in 2002. The number of video products published came to 17,856 titles, with the distribution of 241 million cassettes (discs), 38.51% more than in 2002; the number of electronic publications came to 7,207 titles, increasing by 52.92%. Now, there are more than 60,000 community reading rooms and more than 10,000 farm house reading rooms. 4,400 titles of publications suitable for rural reading have been recommended to rural areas, benefiting more than 200 million urban and rural people. It is planned that every village will have a reading room so that rural people would not find it difficult to read books or newspapers. In order to realize sharing of quality cultural resources between town and country, the state has launched a cultural sharing program through satellite networks, Internet and cable digital TV networks. Now the amount of digital resources commonly shared has reached 60TB (1TB=250,000 copies of electronic books or 926 hours of TV programs). Now the national service network has covered nearly 100 million people. Digital film shows are being tried out in 16 cities in eight provinces and autonomous regions. At present, the welfare edition of digital films issued in the rural areas has come to 383, used for 1,658 times in 470,000 shows. This is a way of better protecting the cultural rights of the people.

   Sixthly, rights and interest of women and children have been better protected. The equal rights of women have gradually been realized and the subsistence and development conditions of women and children have improved. The proportion of women employed accounts for 45% of the total employment. The number of women participating in the handling of state affairs is assuming an upward trend. The proportion of women cadres is nearing 40% of the total. The rural women living in poverty has been reduced by more than 4 million as compared with 2000. The poverty incidence has been reduced further. The "Spring Bud" program has donated to more than 400 primary schools, supporting 1.7 million girl students. At present, the mean life expectancy of women has risen to 74.1 years. The mortality rate of pregnant and lying-in women has dropped from 53/100,000 to 47.7/100,000. The mortality rate of infants and children under 5 has dropped by 41% and 43%, respectively, over 2000. There are 23 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities in the country that have local laws and regulations on the prevention and stoppage of domestic violence and 13 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities have completed the revision of the detailed rules for implementing the law on the protection of the rights and interests of women. Nearly 10 provincial women's federations have established legal aid centers and nearly 8,000 cadres of women's federations have become people's jurors. The national hotline for safeguarding the rights of women, the anti-domestic violence hotline and the hotline for safeguarding the rights of women without fixed residences have received more than 50,000 calls.

   Seventhly, the level of handicapped people's right protection has been improved. During the 10th five-year plan period, 30 provinces and municipalities promulgated detailed rules for implementing the law on the protection of the rights and interests of people with disabilities. In 2006, eight provinces, 103 cities and 406 counties (county-level cities and districts) produced laws and regulations on the building of barrier-free facilities. By the end of 2006, the country had set up 2,279 legal aid (service) centers for persons with disabilities who received legal aid and services averaged more than 100,000 a year. In 2006, 23,000 cases involving handicapped people received law services and 185 cases that encroached upon the lawful rights and interests of people with disabilities were uncovered and punished. The China Federation for Persons with Disabilities and provincial level federations handled 6,662 letters of complaints and received 21,180 visitors, effectively safeguarding the lawful rights and interests of handicapped people. In 2003, the China Federation for Persons with Disabilities and Sichuan, Shaanxi and Beijing opened hotlines for protecting rights and up to the present they have received about 34,000 calls. The subsistence and development conditions for handicapped people have also improved. A sample survey issued by the State Statistical Bureau in May 2007 shows that, compared with 1987, the educational level of people with disabilities had risen sharply, with the number among 100,000 handicapped people who have a higher education rising from 287 to 1,139 and those with a senior secondary education rising from 1,665 to 4,893, those with a junior secondary education rising from 6,156 to 15,039, those with a primary education rising from 24,268 to 31,851 and the illiteracy rate among people aged 15 and above dropping by 15.71%. On December 10, 2003, Chairman Deng Pufang of the China Federation for Persons with Disabilities won the UN Human Rights Award at the 59th UN General Assembly. That was the first time for a Chinese to receive such award and also the first handicapped person to receive it. This means a high appraisal of the outstanding contributions by Deng Pufang to the cause of the handicapped and also the international community's approval of China's achievements in promoting and protecting human rights.

VI. Develop equal, united, mutual-aid and harmonious relations among all Ethnic Groups and effectively protect the lawful rights of  Ethnic minorities.

   Over the past five years, the areas inhabited by people of ethnic minorities have realized historic leap in modernization and all rights of the people have been brought under effective protection and development.

   Firstly, political rights as masters of the state are well protected. China follows the system of national regional autonomy for ethnic minorities and protects by law the political rights of such citizens in equally participating in and managing state affairs and independently managing the affairs of their own areas and exercising autonomy in their own affairs. The leading government posts of 155 national autonomous places are held by people of ethnic minorities. The autonomous government organs have also a large number of cadres from different ethnic minorities. At present, there are 2.994 million cadres of minority nationalities, 15,000 more than in 2002. Among the cadres at the sectional and county level and above in the national Party and government organs and people’s organizations, there are 50,000 from ethnic minorities, 19% more than in 2002.

  Secondly, economic and social rights of ethnic minorities have been improved steadily. The Chinese government has steadily increased investment in the economic and social development of areas inhabited by ethnic minorities and in improving their living standards. In the recent five years, with the progress of the Western China Development Strategy, major projects undertaken by the state, including the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, natural gas transmission from the west to the east, the power transmission from the west to the east have been completed or in smooth progress. The state has also built a number of airports, freeways, major hydroelectric power projects and telecommunications projects, which have given a big impetus to the economic and social development in the areas and helped improving the living and production conditions of the local people. Statistics show that in 2006 the fiscal revenue in areas practicing national autonomy reached 163.1 billion yuan, 1.07 times more than in 2002. The total production value in these areas reached 2051.9 billion yuan, 63.5% more than in 2002, averaging a real annual growth of 13.2%, higher than the national average growth. The proportion of the total production value in these areas in the national total economic aggregate rose from 8.72% in 2002 to 8.94%. The per capita total production value has reached 10,832yuan, 5,415 yuan more than in 2002, with its proportion in the national total rising from 57.3% in 2002 to 60.8%. The per capita disposable income reached 9,615 yuan, 2,798 yuan more than in 2002.

   In the recent six years, the transfer payments to the western regions by the central finance have added up to 404.4 billion yuan, 52.6% of the national total in the same period. The central finance has also committed more than 31 billion yuan to improving the rural production and living conditions in the western region, bringing about historic changes in the rural communications. 99% of the townships in the region have had access to electricity use; more than 30 million people have had clean water to drink; nearly 1.5 million biogas pits have been built; a massive migration of 1.22 million people living in the ecologically vulnerable areas has been realized. In order to accelerate the development of the border regions, the state has launched an action of reinvigorating the borders and making the local people wealthy. From 2000 to 2006, the central finance committed a total of 485 million yuan to the building of more than 20,000 projects for the benefit of the local people of ethnic minorities. The Tibet Autonomous Region has made great efforts to improve the production and living conditions of the farmers and herdsmen. In the recent five years, the region has invested 6.1 billion yuan in the farming and livestock breeding areas, enabling the local people to see a double-digit growth in their per capita income starting from 2003, with that in 2006 growing 17.2% over the preceding year and that in the first nine months of 2007 registering a 19% year-on-year increase. The number of Tibetan farmers and herdsmen enjoying free medical treatment has reached 2.37 million. The "five guarantee standards" in the farming and livestock breeding areas are generally higher than the average rural level in the country. More than 500,000 farmers and herdsmen have bid farewell to the no-electricity history. Starting from 2006, Tibet has launched an affordable housing project, which has enabled 56,000 families, about 290,000 people, to move into new houses. By 2010, over 80% of the farmers and herdsmen would live in safe and comfortable houses.

   The general educational level of the citizens of minority nationalities has been rising. The proportion of students from minority ethnic groups in the regular institutions of higher learning rose from 5.8% in 2002 to 6.1% by 2005, with the number of students increasing from 520,000 to more than 950,000. The number of regular institutions of higher learning in the areas inhabited by minorities increased from 168 in 2002 to 239 in 2006, with the students at school rising from 770,000 to 1.46 million. At present, more than 100 schools in the country enroll students of ethnic minorities for pre-college courses or for classes especially devoted to students of ethnic minorities, with the annual total enrolment reaching about 20,000. Besides, the schools affiliated to the State Commission for Ethnic Affairs have offered classes for ethnic groups that have a small population and provided them with preferential policies, helping 22 minority groups with a small population to train personnel. The state has also made great efforts to train high-level personnel for ethnic minorities. In 2007, the state enrolled 3,000 minority students to work for master’s degree and 700, to work for doctor's degree.

   Thirdly, fine traditional cultures of ethnic minorities are well protected and developed. The state has launched an operation for rescuing and protecting China's oral and intangible heritages. Among the first group of national intangible cultural heritage, more than 170 come from ethnic minorities, accounting for more than 30% of the total. Five cultural and natural heritages, including the Potala Palace of Tibet and Ancient City of Lijiang in Yunnan have been inscribed into the "List of World Heritages". The Uygur "12 Muqam" and the "Long Tune of the Mongolians" have been inscribed into the list of "Master Pieces of the UN Oral and Intangible Cultural Heritages".The collection of ten major folk arts, including songs and dances, has basically been completed. Progress has been made in the protection of endangered written languages of some ethnic minorities. Up to the present, China has discovered more than 40 languages that are on the verge of extinction and published nearly 100 treatises and set up a number of databanks. Statistics show that the number of ancient classics of ethnic minorities that have been rescued and sorted out has come to more than 300,000 titles, with more than 5,000 titles in 7 major categories published. This is an effective way of rescuing and protecting the fine traditional cultures of the ethnic minorities. There are more than 30 publishing houses that publish books in more than 20 languages of minorities. They publish more than 4,000 titles of books a year, with distribution running up to about 50 million copies. There are 99 newspapers published in 10 minority languages. A complete system of book, newspaper and periodical publishing has already taken shape, covering a wide ranging areas and in almost all the minority languages.

   The cultural activities of ethnic minorities have been enriched. By the end of 2005, there were 525 performing art troupes, 55 song and dance ensembles and 166 theaters and cinemas in the areas practicing national autonomy. There were 24 art schools at the tertiary and secondary levels specializing in the training of art workers of ethnic minorities. These areas have exceeded the national average in the number of cultural units per 100,000 people. Marked progress has been made in the national border cultural gallery project, radio and TV broadcasting reaching every village project and the radio and TV coverage in Tibet and Xinjiang. By the end of June 2006, governments at all levels had invested 3.64 billion yuan in solving the problem of radio and TV reception in 70 million villagers of 117,000 administrative villages. At present, the radio and TV coverage in the areas inhabited by ethnic minorities has reached 85% and 90%, respectively.

VII. Carry out exchanges and cooperation on an equal footing and make concerted efforts to promote human rights development in the world.

   Over the past five years, China has, for the purpose of promoting lasting peace, common prosperity and harmonious world, taken an active part in handling the international political, economic, cultural and security affairs and in human rights activities of the United Nations, making its due contributions to the healthy development of human rights cause of the world.

   Firstly, taking an active part in developing and improving international human rights theories and the mechanism for protecting human rights. China is an ardent supporter of the purposes and principles of the UN Charter with regard to the promotion and protection of human rights. It supports the United Nations in making human rights, development and security the three major kingpins. It has taken an active part in establishing the UN Human Rights Council and, with a constructive attitude, participated in formulating constitutions and rules for the proposed council, thus making its due contributions to improving the UN human rights insurance mechanism. China has sent its delegations to all kinds of meetings on human rights and faithfully performed its duties in the related organizations. It has actively participated in reviewing and discussing subjects concerning human rights and offered its own proposals and views in a high sense of responsibility in order to enrich and broaden the contents of international human rights concept and resist the attempt to use human rights to create confrontations, thus making its unique contributions to international cooperation in the human rights area. China is also active in drafting documents about international human rights. In recent years, it has participated in the drafting of such international documents as International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and the Convention on the Protection of the Rights of People with Disabilities. China has ratified or acceded to 22 international conventions concerning human rights, including the International Covenant on the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. It has done everything possible to perform its obligations and submit timely reports on its obligation performance to accept the review by the UN treaty bodies. The Chinese government is accelerating the pace of ratifying the International Covenant on the Civil and Political Rights.

   Secondly, carrying out active international cooperation in human rights. China has actively carried out human rights dialogue, exchanges and cooperation with the UN human rights organizations and other countries on the basis of equality and mutual respect. Since 2000, when China and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) signed a Memorandum of Understanding in Cooperation, the two sides have successfully carried a series of cooperation projects. In 2005, OHCHR and China's foreign ministry signed the second memo. Over the past two years, the technical cooperation projects of the two sides have been proceeding smoothly. Over the past five years, China has conducted rounds of dialogue or consultation with Australia, Canada, Britain, EU, Norway, Germany and the Netherlands and carried out exchanges and cooperation with Viet Nam, Laos, Eritrea, Sierra Leone, Zimbabwe and other developing countries. It sponsored the Asia-Europe-Africa human rights seminar, the Sino-African human rights seminar and multilateral and bilateral symposiums with Europe, Australia, Canada and Norway. In the meanwhile, the China Society for Human Rights Studies (CSHRS) and other non-governmental organizations have carried out extensive exchanges and cooperation with OHCHR and the governments, parliaments and non-governmental organizations of the United States, Germany, Austria, Ireland, Egypt and Viet Nam. The dialogues, exchanges and cooperation have helped enhance mutual trust and understanding between China and the international community on the issue of human rights, thus reinforcing the foundations for sharing experiences and making common efforts to cope with challenges.

   Thirdly, undertake international duties and obligations and take an active part in promoting international peace and humanitarianism. China has displayed a positive role in the international cooperation in such areas as anti-terrorism, anti-nuclear proliferation, peace keeping, labor, education, health and environment that are associated with human rights. China has taken the initiative to ratify and accede to more than 300 multilateral international treaties and got involved in more than 130 inter-governmental international organizations and provided more than 110 countries and regions with more than 2,000 aid projects. Since 1990, China has sent troupes to participate in 17 UN peace keeping missions, including in the Sudan, Lebanon and Liberia. At present, there are more than 1,600 Chinese peace-keeping military personnel still performing their duties in ten peace keeping areas and in the UN peace keeping forces, making strenuous efforts to protect the life and property of the local people. They have become envoys of safeguarding world peace and defending human rights. China is one of the countries that have won the most peace honors from the United Nations. In 2002, China set up an international rescue team, which has played an increasingly important role in the international humanitarian rescue operations. Over the past few years, the rescue team performed their duties in the 2003 Algeria 6.7 magnitude earthquake and the Iran's Bam 7.0 magnitude earthquake, the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, the 2005 Pakistan 7.8 magnitude and the 2006 Indonesia's Java 6.2 magnitude earthquake. They have provided sincere help within their capacity in the rescue operation and post-disaster reconstruction. They have won extensive appraisal for their lofty internationalism and humanitarianism.

   Fourthly, contribute to improving the conditions for human subsistence by its mutually beneficial opening up and development. While doing its own construction and development, China has always associated its own development with the common progress of mankind and done everything possible to bring about wins for all sides and help all countries share the fruit of economic globalization and science and technological progress. According to the recent World Bank figures for 2003 ~2006, China's economic growth contributed to 13.8% of the world GDP growth, next to the United States only. China has economic and trade relations with more than 200 countries and regions and signed or is negotiating free trade pacts with 27 countries and regions. China is the third largest trading power in the world. Its cheap and quality goods have kept flowing to other countries, helping the importing countries to raise the real income levels of the people, stimulate their consumption growth and improve their living conditions. In 2003~2006, China’s import registered an average annual growth of 28.3%. China's annual import demand of more than US$500 billion has provided other countries with a broad market and has pulled the strong growth of exports and economic development of many countries and also helped some countries create more than 10 million jobs. Although China is a developing country, it has always stretched out to provide aid to other developing countries. The 2006 Sino-African cooperation forum can well be held up as a milestone for south-south cooperation. Under the frame, China has exempted 10.9 billion yuan of debts for 31 African countries and set the tariff at zero for 190 tax numbers of commodities exported by the least developed African countries. China’s development has not only benefited the 1.3 billion Chinese but also contributed to the improvement of the rights to subsistence and development of the people of other countries.

   China is a developing country with a population of 1.3 billion. Limited by natural, historical, cultural, economic and social development levels, China still has many problems and difficulties in human rights development. Its political and economic systems remain to be improved; democracy and the legal system is still not sound enough; there are still great disparities in the economic and social development between town and country and among different regions; the problems and difficulties in employment, social security, income distribution, education, medical service, housing and safe production are still affecting the immediate interests and rights of the people. The recently closed 17th Party congress has put forward clear policies and measures for tackling these problems and difficulties. We have every reason to believe that so long as we stick firmly to the principle of respecting and protecting human rights, continue reform and development and constantly promote democracy and the rule of law, China’ human rights conditions will improve steadily with the development of its modernization.