China protects cultural rights of ethnic groups

BEIJING - The cultural rights of ethnic groups are protected in China, says a government report on the country's human rights progress in 2012 issued Tuesday.

The state formulated and implemented the 12th Five-year Plan for Development of Undertakings Related to Ethnic Minority Groups, says the report, released by the Information Office of the State Council, or the Cabinet.

The report gave a string of figures while detailing China's achievements in protecting cultural rights of ethnic groups over the years.

China's 55 ethnic groups have 515 of their representative cultural items included in the national intangible cultural heritage list, and have 524 individuals ranked as successors of their intangible cultural heritages, according to the report.

By May 2012 there were 73 radio broadcasting stations in ethnic autonomous areas, airing 441 programs including 105 programs broadcast in local ethnic languages; and there were 90 television stations broadcasting 489 programs, including 100 in local ethnic languages.

By the end of 2011, books were published in 23 ethnic languages nationwide. There were also 84 newspapers and 223 periodicals published in ethnic languages.

Bilingual teaching is done in the classroom in more than 10,000 schools around the country, using 29 languages of 21 ethnic groups together with mandarin, offering bilingual instruction to over 6 million students.

In 2011, 3,665 titles of ethnic language textbooks were published, with a total print-run of over 47,030,000 copies.