Progress in human rights protection hailed

A white paper issued by the State Council Information Office on Friday lauded "remarkable progress" in the law-based protection of human rights over the past five years.

According to the paper, titled New Progress in the Legal Protection of Human Rights in China, the country has opened a new era.

The paper expounded on the progress in human rights protection in six parts - improving the legal framework to ensure human rights; promoting law-based administration; enhancing judicial protection of human rights; consolidating social mechanisms; strengthening Party leadership in the legal protection of human rights; and promoting the development of global human rights.

Efforts to protect human rights in China have made much headway and are contributing to the diversity of human civilization and providing Chinese wisdom and solutions to promote social progress, it said.

China has improved legislation to better protect the civil and political rights of its people by revising the Criminal Law; and to promote humanitarianism, China has implemented the amnesty system stipulated in its Constitution, the paper said.

China has also improved its laws to protect special groups. The paper noted the enactment of the Anti-Domestic Violence Law, making clear the legal liabilities of perpetrators and the procedures to be followed by investigators to protect victims.

China has also enhanced judicial protections for human rights. Efforts to prevent and correct wrongful convictions included the correction of 37 major cases of miscarriage of justice involving 61 people, as well as the acquittal of 4,032 defendants under the law from 2013 to 2017, it said.

Since 2013, procuratorates have withheld their approval of 2,624 arrests and declined to prosecute 870 cases because of illegally obtained evidence.

China has fought corruption to guarantee people's interests. The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, for example, has investigated more than 440 Party-member officials at or above provincial level and other senior officials since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, it said.

The white paper said China has been actively promoting the development of global human rights under the rule of law.

From 1990 to August this year, 36,000 Chinese military personnel were sent abroad to take part in 24 UN peacekeeping operations. This year, China created a peacekeeping standby force of 8,000 troops.

Xinhua