People's Daily - October 31, 2026

CPC Central Committee Holds Symposium with Non-Party Personages

■ To govern the country, one must first govern the Party; to strengthen the country, one must first strengthen the Party. The longer the Party has been in power, the longer the period of peace and stability, and the more complex the environment, the more necessary it is to strengthen the awareness of potential dangers and achieve maintaining vigilance during times of peace (居安思危, ju an si wei - "dwell in peace, think of danger"), and to persist with constancy in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, ensuring that the Communist Party of China always remains the strong leading core of the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics.

■ To persist with constancy in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, sustained efforts must be made to resolve prominent problems within the Party. It is necessary to adhere to the combination of goal orientation and problem orientation, accurately grasp and thoroughly analyze the new changes in the Party's conditions and the new situation facing Party building, and study effective and practical countermeasures and measures in light of new realities. To resolve problems existing within the Party, one must first base oneself on the Communist Party of China's own strength, continuously realizing the Party's self-purification, self-improvement, self-renovation, and self-enhancement; it is also necessary to rely on the support of the people, actively accept supervision by the people, and listen to advice with humility (虚心听取, xu xin ting qu - "empty, heart, listen, take") to criticism from the masses, transforming the people's endorsement and support into a powerful driving force for persisting with constancy in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party.

■ To advance the great new project of Party building in the new era, it is necessary to adhere to systematic thinking, strengthen forward-looking consideration, overall planning, and holistic advancement. It is necessary to thoroughly study and implement Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, uphold and strengthen the centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee, uphold the strict tone without wavering, improve the system for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, take the Party's political construction as the guide, and comprehensively advance all aspects of Party building. It is necessary to uphold the simultaneous management of Party spirit, Party conduct, and Party discipline, integrate the rectification of conduct, the enforcement of discipline, and the fight against corruption, organically combine the management of people, affairs, and power, and unify the tempering of Party spirit, the improvement of capabilities, and the purification of the political ecosystem. It is necessary to uphold the principle of leading by example, starting with and strictly managing leading cadres, strengthening education, management, and supervision, and guiding Party members and cadres to achieve being prudent in solitude, in beginnings, and in small matters (慎独慎初慎微, shen du shen chu shen wei - "cautious, alone, cautious, beginning, cautious, subtle") and exercising self-respect, self-examination, self-warning, and self-encouragement (自重自省自警自励, zi zhong zi xing zi jing zi li - "self, respect, self, examine, self, warn, self, encourage").

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) The CPC Central Committee held a symposium with non-Party personages at Zhongnanhai on August 21 to solicit opinions and suggestions from the central committees of various democratic parties, the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, and representatives of personages without party affiliation on the CPC Central Committee's decision on several major issues concerning persisting with constancy in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, presided over the symposium and delivered an important speech, emphasizing that to govern the country, one must first govern the Party; to strengthen the country, one must first strengthen the Party. The longer the Party has been in power, the longer the period of peace and stability, and the more complex the environment, the more necessary it is to strengthen the awareness of potential dangers and achieve maintaining vigilance during times of peace, and to persist with constancy in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, ensuring that the Communist Party of China always remains the strong leading core of the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics.

Wang Huning, Cai Qi, and Li Xi, members of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, attended the symposium.

At the symposium, Zheng Jianbang, Chairman of the Central Committee of the Revolutionary Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang; Ding Zhongli, Chairman of the Central Committee of the China Democratic League; Hao Mingjin, Chairman of the Central Committee of the China National Democratic Construction Association; Cai Dafeng, Chairman of the Central Committee of the China Association for Promoting Democracy; He Wei, Chairman of the Central Committee of the Chinese Peasants' and Workers' Democratic Party; Jiang Zuojun, Chairman of the Central Committee of the China Zhi Gong Party; Wu Weihua, Chairman of the Central Committee of the Jiusan Society; Su Hui, Chairman of the Central Committee of the Taiwan Democratic Self-Government League; Gao Yunlong, Chairman of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce; and Li Wei, representative of personages without party affiliation, spoke in succession. They expressed complete agreement with the draft decision of the CPC Central Committee on several major issues concerning persisting with constancy in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and unanimously agreed that since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, under the strong leadership of the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, full and rigorous self-governance of the Party has achieved great accomplishments, opened up a new realm of self-revolution for the century-old major Party, promoted historic achievements and historic changes in the cause of the Party and the state, and the Party and the people have won the historical initiative of strengthening the Party and strengthening the country. They also put forward opinions and suggestions on thoroughly studying and implementing Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, strengthening the arming of the Party's innovative theories, establishing and practicing a correct view of political achievements, strengthening political guidance, promoting the simultaneous and coordinated efforts of people's supervision and the Party's self-revolution, optimizing assessment, evaluation, and accountability mechanisms, attaching importance to improving cadres' scientific literacy, strengthening the restriction and supervision of the exercise of power, telling well the story of the Communist Party of China in the new era, and extensively publicizing the great achievements of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party.

After carefully listening to everyone's speeches, Xi Jinping delivered an important speech. He pointed out that the CPC Central Committee's solicitation of opinions from the central committees of various democratic parties, the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, and personages without party affiliation on important Party documents and major national policies and guidelines is an important manifestation of whole-process people's democracy, especially socialist consultative democracy. In February this year, the CPC Central Committee entrusted the United Front Work Department of the CPC Central Committee to specifically solicit opinions from non-Party personages on the agenda of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee. Everyone put forward very good opinions and suggestions in their speeches just now, and we will seriously study and absorb them. On behalf of the CPC Central Committee, he expressed gratitude to everyone.

Xi Jinping emphasized that the key to running China's affairs well lies in the Communist Party of China and in full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, we have unswervingly advanced full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and the Communist Party of China has become stronger and more capable through revolutionary tempering. At the same time, it must be recognized that as the world conditions, national conditions, and Party conditions undergo profound changes, full and rigorous self-governance of the Party faces many new situations and new problems. It is necessary to stand at the strategic height of maintaining the Party's advanced nature and purity, consolidating the Party's ruling position, and realizing the Party's mission and tasks, strengthen confidence, maintain strategic resolve, and truly govern the Communist Party of China well and build it strong.

Xi Jinping pointed out that to persist with constancy in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, sustained efforts must be made to resolve prominent problems within the Party. It is necessary to adhere to the combination of goal orientation and problem orientation, accurately grasp and thoroughly analyze the new changes in the Party's conditions and the new situation facing Party building, and study effective and practical countermeasures and measures in light of new realities. To resolve problems existing within the Party, one must first base oneself on the Communist Party of China's own strength, continuously realizing the Party's self-purification, self-improvement, self-renovation, and self-enhancement; it is also necessary to rely on the support of the people, actively accept supervision by the people, and listen to advice with humility to criticism from the masses, transforming the people's endorsement and support into a powerful driving force for persisting with constancy in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party.

Xi Jinping emphasized that to advance the great new project of Party building in the new era, it is necessary to adhere to systematic thinking, strengthen forward-looking consideration, overall planning, and holistic advancement. It is necessary to thoroughly study and implement the thought on Party building in the new era, uphold and strengthen the centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee, uphold the strict tone without wavering, improve the system for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, take the Party's political construction as the guide, and comprehensively advance all aspects of Party building. It is necessary to uphold the simultaneous management of Party spirit, Party conduct, and Party discipline, integrate the rectification of conduct, the enforcement of discipline, and the fight against corruption, organically combine the management of people, affairs, and power, and unify the tempering of Party spirit, the improvement of capabilities, and the purification of the political ecosystem. It is necessary to uphold the principle of leading by example, starting with and strictly managing leading cadres, strengthening education, management, and supervision, and guiding Party members and cadres to achieve being prudent in solitude, in beginnings, and in small matters and exercising self-respect, self-examination, self-warning, and self-encouragement.

Xi Jinping pointed out that it is necessary to uphold, develop, and improve China's new type of Party system. It is hoped that the various democratic parties, the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, and personages without party affiliation will not forget the original aspiration of multi-party cooperation, firmly support the leadership of the Communist Party of China, continuously consolidate the common ideological and political foundation, actively offer advice to assist in policymaking (建言资政, jian yan zi zheng - "build, words, assist, politics"), give full play to the function of democratic supervision, and be good staff officers, good assistants, and good colleagues of the Communist Party of China.

Yin Li, Shi Taifeng, Li Ganjie, Li Shulei, Li Hongzhong, He Lifeng, Chen Wenqing, Liu Jinguo, Wang Xiaohong, Zhang Shengmin, Wu Zhenglong, and Mu Hong, as well as responsible persons of relevant departments of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, attended the symposium.

Other non-Party personages attending the symposium included Shao Hong, He Baoxiang, Wang Guangqian, Qin Boyong, Zhu Yongxin, Yang Zhen, Zhang Endi, An Lijia, and Wu Chen.

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Xi Jinping Holds Talks with German President Steinmeier

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporter Yang Qiaochu) On the afternoon of October 30, President Xi Jinping held talks with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who was in China for a state visit, at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing.

Xi Jinping noted that since the establishment of diplomatic relations more than half a century ago, China-Germany relations have maintained a high level of development and have always been friends of mutual trust and partners who achieve success together. At present, the once-in-a-century transformation of the world is accelerating, and the aspects of change and turbulence are becoming more prominent. As the world's second and third largest economies, China and Germany bear important responsibility for the development of China-Europe relations and the stable growth of the world economy, and should therefore strengthen communication and coordination, forge a new model of cooperation featuring equality, mutual benefit, and strategic stability, and send a positive signal to the outside world that openness is preferred over closure and cooperation over confrontation. China is willing to work with Germany to open a new chapter in the two countries' all-round strategic partnership and promote the building of a more just and reasonable global governance system.

Xi Jinping stressed that governance thrives on consistency. China's policy toward Germany is coherent, stable, and predictable. China attaches great importance to Germany's status as a major country, has always supported Germany's unity and development, and is glad to see Germany play a greater role in European and international affairs. It is hoped that Germany will view China's development and cooperation with China with an open and positive attitude, adhere to a rational, pragmatic, and friendly policy toward China, and uphold mutual respect and equal treatment — this is also the valuable experience that has underpinned the sustained and sound development of China-Germany relations. Germany is a representative of advanced manufacturing and high-quality products, while China is advancing Chinese modernization through high-quality development. The development strategies of the two sides are complementary, and there is broad space for cooperation. China is firmly advancing high-level opening up and continuously optimizing the business environment. China welcomes enterprises from Germany and other countries to deepen their roots in China and share in the dividends of its super-large market. It is hoped that Germany will uphold openness and inclusiveness and provide a fair, transparent, and non-discriminatory business environment for Chinese enterprises going to Germany, so as to strengthen and expand China-Germany practical cooperation. China is willing to carry out cooperation with Germany in such fields as artificial intelligence, green and low-carbon development, trade in services, and the digital economy, jointly enhance future competitiveness, and add new dimensions and momentum to China-Germany cooperation. The peoples of China and Germany both possess the fine qualities of diligence, wisdom, and resilience, and both support China-Germany friendship. The two sides should support cultural, educational, and artistic exchanges, facilitate people-to-people exchanges, promote mutual understanding between the peoples, and create a favorable atmosphere for jointly celebrating the 55th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Germany next year.

Xi Jinping pointed out that China has always regarded the EU as a partner and has developed relations with Europe with sincerity and goodwill. History and reality have repeatedly proven that in China-Europe cooperation, cooperation outweighs competition and consensus outweighs differences. The essence of China-Europe economic and trade relations is complementary advantages and mutually beneficial and win-win outcomes (互利共赢, hu li gong ying - "mutual benefit, win together"), the path to achieving success together is mutual respect and mutual accommodation, and the key to coordinated development is seeking common ground while reserving differences (求同存异, qiu tong cun yi - "seek same, preserve difference") and upholding fundamental principles and breaking new ground. China-Europe relations have weathered storms, and some problems that have emerged in the course of cooperation are problems of development and contradictions of progress. As long as both sides hold fast to the positioning of partnership and uphold the tone of equal dialogue, differences and problems will always be resolved and will not hinder the forward development of China-Europe relations. It is hoped that the European side will join China in moving towards each other in a common direction (相向而行, xiang xiang er xing - "facing each other, walk"), and work hand in hand to advance an equal and orderly multipolar world and a universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalization.

Xi Jinping briefed Steinmeier on the situation of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. Xi Jinping pointed out that to govern the country, one must first govern the Party, and only when the Party thrives can the country be strong. Persisting in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party will surely win broad support and endorsement from the people. The Communist Party of China is willing to exchange experiences in governance with major political parties from countries around the world, including Germany.

Steinmeier said that over the past 25 years, he has visited China eight times and witnessed China's rapid development, with China presenting a brand-new look each time. China has become a major world power playing a decisive or pivotal role (举足轻重, ju zu qing zhong - "lift foot, light weight") in political influence and economic, scientific, and technological strength, and the German side is full of respect for the tremendous development achievements China has made under the leadership of President Xi Jinping. Germany-China relations are close, mutually beneficial, and dynamic. The two sides have always respected each other and engaged in equal dialogue, and cooperation in various fields has achieved tangible results, contributing to each other's development. Germany firmly adheres to the One-China policy, is full of confidence in the prospects of bilateral relations, and is willing to maintain high-level exchanges with China, strengthen cooperation in trade, science and technology, artificial intelligence, environmental protection, and other fields, and promote people-to-people and cultural exchanges. The two sides can properly handle economic and trade differences through dialogue and consultation, achieve mutual benefit and win-win results, and set an example for the world. The international order is under pressure, and the world expects China to play a greater role. Germany is willing to jointly shoulder with China the responsibility of safeguarding world peace and development, uphold the purposes and principles of the UN Charter, safeguard the authority of international law, support free trade and WTO rules, oppose protectionism, and oppose trade wars.

Before the talks, Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan held a welcome ceremony for Steinmeier and his wife Elke Büdenbender at the square outside the East Gate of the Great Hall of the People.

When Steinmeier arrived, honor guards lined up to pay tribute. The two heads of state ascended the reviewing stand, the military band played the national anthems of China and Germany, and a 21-gun salute was fired at Tiananmen Square. Steinmeier, accompanied by Xi Jinping, reviewed the guard of honor of the People's Liberation Army of China and watched the march-past.

In the evening, Xi Jinping and Peng Liyuan held a welcome banquet for Steinmeier and his wife in the Golden Hall of the Great Hall of the People.

Wang Yi attended the above events.

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Xi Jinping Meets with Swiss Federal President Viola Amherd

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporter Gong Han) On the afternoon of October 30, President Xi Jinping met at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing with Swiss Federal President Viola Amherd, who was in China for a working visit.

Xi Jinping noted that Switzerland is an important partner of China in Europe, and its cooperation with China has always been at the forefront among European countries. At a time when surging countercurrents (逆流涌动, ni liu yong dong - "reverse, current, surge, move") of unilateralism and protectionism are prevalent, free trade cooperation has become the most distinctive hallmark of China-Switzerland relations, fully demonstrating the political courage and sense of responsibility of both countries in upholding openness and cooperation, and highlighting their unique leading role in promoting the building of an open world economy. Economies of all countries advance together when they are interconnected, and retreat separately when they are closed off. China is willing to work with Switzerland to hold high the banner of openness, strengthen the bonds of cooperation, promote universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalization, and jointly inject valuable confidence and greater certainty into China-Europe economic and trade cooperation and global economic development.

Xi Jinping stressed that since the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Switzerland, the two sides have adhered to achieving success together through mutual support (相互成就, xiang hu cheng jiu - "mutually, achieve, accomplish") and daring to be a pioneer (敢为人先, gan wei ren xian - "dare, be, person, first"), continuously interpreting the China-Switzerland spirit of cooperation featuring "equality, innovation, and win-win" with concrete results, and becoming a model for interactions between countries of different sizes and different social systems. The two sides should respect each other, treat each other as equals, and strengthen exchanges and policy coordination at all levels and across the board. China is accelerating the development of new quality productive forces and steadily expanding institutional opening up, and is willing to turn the Chinese market into a market for the world and a market shared by all. The two sides should adhere to mutual benefit and win-win outcomes, turning the blueprint of openness and cooperation into a visible and tangible reality. They should strengthen innovation cooperation, focus on fostering cooperation in emerging industries such as the digital economy, green energy storage, and artificial intelligence, build high-quality industrial and supply chains featuring collaborative innovation and shared benefits, and jointly promote the positive and ethical development of artificial intelligence for the benefit of mankind.

Xi Jinping pointed out that Switzerland has long played an important exemplary role in China-Europe economic and trade exchanges, and he hopes that the Swiss side will leverage its unique influence to play a positive role in promoting balanced and steady development of China-Europe trade. China and Switzerland share similar positions and concepts in supporting multilateralism. The two sides should deepen multilateral coordination and mutual support, firmly uphold the international system with the United Nations at its core and the international order based on international law, reform and improve the global governance system, and promote the building of a community with a shared future for mankind.

Amherd stated that as one of the first Western countries to recognize the People's Republic of China, Switzerland has always been deeply proud of this, which opened a lasting and dynamic partnership between the two countries. Since the establishment of diplomatic relations, the two sides have always respected each other, maintained close high-level exchanges, and achieved fruitful cooperation results in many fields such as trade and investment, scientific research and innovation, and labor and employment. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the establishment of the China-Switzerland Innovative Strategic Partnership. The two sides completed the upgrade negotiations of the free trade agreement with high quality in a short period of time, reflecting the high level of mutual trust between the two sides, meeting the expectations of enterprises and all parties in both countries, and will inject new impetus into the development of China-Switzerland relations. The Swiss side firmly adheres to the One-China policy, looks forward to strengthening dialogue and exchanges with China, adhering to mutually beneficial cooperation, and promoting greater development of cooperation in various fields. Switzerland attaches great importance to the positive role China plays in international affairs, and is willing to maintain close coordination with China, uphold multilateralism, safeguard free trade, and contribute to world development, prosperity, peace, and stability.

After the meeting, the two heads of state jointly witnessed the signing of the protocol on upgrading the China-Switzerland Free Trade Agreement and a number of cooperation documents in fields such as scientific research, labor and employment, and media.

Wang Yi attended the above activities.

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A Programmatic Document for Advancing the Great New Project of Party Building in the New Era

By: 本报记者 孙 振 杜尚泽 新华社记者 张晓松 朱基钗

"To run China's affairs well, the key lies in the Party, and the key lies in full and rigorous self-governance of the Party."

A Party that is committed to the eternal great cause of the Chinese nation and persists in seeking happiness for the Chinese people and rejuvenation for the Chinese nation has never ceased its solid steps toward strengthening its own construction.

From October 26 to 29, the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party was held in Beijing, focusing its research on the issue of persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party.

The Plenary Session heard and discussed the work report delivered by General Secretary Xi Jinping on behalf of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, and deliberated and adopted the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning Persistently Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party." The General Secretary explained the "Decision (Draft)" to the Plenary Session.

The explanation opens by elaborating on the considerations behind setting this theme, "This is a major decision made by the Party Central Committee based on acting according to the prevailing circumstances (审时度势, shen shi du shi - "examine the time, assess the situation"), overall consideration, grasping the historical position of the development of the Party and the country's cause, and focusing on the overall situation of Chinese modernization."

A "programmatic document for advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era" has been produced, and its weight for the new journey of Chinese modernization is extremely heavy or significant (千钧重, qian jun zhong - "thousand jin, heavy").

"The Party and the people have won the historical initiative to strengthen the Party and strengthen the country"

The 14th Five-Year Plan has been successfully concluded, and the 15th Five-Year Plan has gotten off to a good start. Since the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party, the report card on reform, development, and stability, and on internal affairs, diplomacy, and national defense, has been weighty.

General Secretary Xi Jinping delivered the work report on behalf of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, which contains both theoretical innovation and practical depth.

During the discussions, participating comrades combined their respective fields of work to share their insights and express confidence. From the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, to the great achievements in governing and managing the Party, rejuvenating and strengthening the Party in the new era; from carrying out study and education on establishing and practicing a correct view of political achievements, to grandly celebrating the 105th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China; from the socialist cause with Chinese characteristics in the new era creating a new situation, to the Two Establishments, a major political achievement of the new era, they connected the report with the draft Decision for discussion and reflection.

The Plenary Session unanimously agreed that great achievements have been made in full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, "fundamentally reversing the lax, weak, and loose state of Party governance and management, curbing some unhealthy tendencies that had long gone unchecked, rectifying some chronic and stubborn diseases that had persisted for many years, eliminating serious hidden dangers within the Party, the state, and the military, and making the Party stronger and more capable through revolutionary tempering."

"Full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era has opened up a new realm of self-revolution for the century-old major Party, promoted historic achievements and historic changes in the cause of the Party and the state, and the Party and the people have won the historical initiative to strengthen the Party and strengthen the country."

Where does the historical initiative come from?

The "Decision" adopted by the Plenary Session puts forward seven principles for persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party: adhere to serving the mission and tasks, adhere to taking the Party's political construction as the guide, adhere to comprehensive strictness, adhere to a problem-oriented approach, adhere to upholding fundamental principles and breaking new ground, adhere to leading by example from above, and adhere to governing the Party according to regulations. The "Decision" points out: "These principles are a scientific summary of the experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era and must be upheld for the long term and continuously enriched and developed."

General Secretary Xi Jinping profoundly pointed out that "serving and obeying the development of the cause of the Party and the state has always been an important principle of Party building" and that "the drafting of the 'Decision (Draft)' adhered to staying true to the Party's original aspiration and founding mission."

Born for the people, thriving because of the people. The thousand-jin promise made when the Red Boat set sail has been integrated into the century-long journey of governing and managing the Party, written into the lines of the "Decision," and has begun to lead another journey of steadfast progress.

The "Decision" "the first section is the first part, which is the general introduction," "elaborating on the importance, urgency, and overall requirements of persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party," reviewing the glorious course, summarizing great achievements, analyzing the situation and tasks, proposing guiding ideology, and clarifying the principles to be followed — concise, profound, and well-ordered.

Among them are the revelations of history, the sublimation of theory, and the distillation of practice.

On the new journey of the new era, General Secretary Xi Jinping has repeatedly pondered how to continue to answer Yan'an's "cave-dwelling question." And this time, in conjunction with the Party's century-long history, the "Decision" profoundly explains: finding the two answers of "letting the people supervise the government" and "self-revolution" to escape the historical cycle of rise and fall, chaos and order, is the unique creation of the Communist Party of China and will forever be recorded in the annals of Marxist party building.

During group discussions, participating comrades hotly debated why it is necessary to "persistently advance," unanimously agreeing that the General Secretary's major thesis on the "three inevitable requirements" in his explanation was like the sounding of great bells and drums:

"This is an inevitable requirement for maintaining the Party's advanced nature and purity and consolidating its long-term governing position";

"This is an inevitable requirement for consolidating and developing the highly united and unified situation of the whole Party and the highly cohesive political situation of the Party, the military, and the people";

"This is an inevitable requirement for fulfilling the Party's historical mission and promoting the steady and long-term development of the cause of the Party and the state."

Since the 18th National Congress of the Party, General Secretary Xi Jinping, with the immense political courage of "even if millions oppose me, I will go," and the strong sense of mission and responsibility of "offending thousands of people, yet not failing the 1.4 billion," has made full and rigorous self-governance of the Party a long-term strategy and eternal subject of the Party, without taking a single step back, and grasping it through to the end.

During the drafting process, the General Secretary personally served as head of the drafting group, deployed extensive solicitation of opinions from all sides, presided over three meetings of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee and two meetings of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee to deliberate and revise the draft "Decision."

During the four-day Plenary Session, multiple group discussions were arranged around the draft "Decision." Leading comrades of the Central Committee went deep into each group to listen to opinions and suggestions, and frequently exchanged views and discussed with everyone. Participating comrades spoke enthusiastically, and a resonance persisted and surged: "The great achievements in governing and managing the Party, rejuvenating and strengthening the Party in the new era, and the creation of a new situation in the socialist cause with Chinese characteristics are fundamentally due to the helm-holding and navigation of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, and due to the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era."

"Strengthening Party spirit is the fundamental task of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party"

"Party spirit is the cornerstone of Party members and cadres' establishment of their person, their career, their words, and their virtue."

The "Decision" makes a dedicated chapter arrangement for strengthening the Party spirit of Communists, and places it first among the seven strategic tasks and major measures for persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, reflecting a profound understanding and grasp of the laws of governing a Marxist ruling party, and further enriching and developing Xi Jinping's thought on Party building.

"Strengthening the Party spirit of Communists," "strictly implementing and enforcing democratic centralism," "forging a high-quality cadre contingent capable of shouldering the heavy task of national rejuvenation," "building a rigorous organizational system that is connected from top to bottom and effective in execution," "unceasingly rectifying work styles and enforcing discipline," "unswervingly advancing the integrated promotion of not daring to be corrupt, not being able to be corrupt, and not wanting to be corrupt," and "adhering to governing the Party by institutions and regulations" — these seven strategic tasks and major measures of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party erect the four beams and eight pillars of "persistent advancement," anchoring the goal of "effectively enhancing the overall efficiency of Party governance and management."

Today's full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is no longer a single-point effort, but rather adheres to taking the Party's political construction as the guide, emphasizes the coordinated efforts of all aspects of Party construction and the articulation and matching of various policies and measures, emphasizes leading by example from above, combining points and areas, and addressing both symptoms and root causes, and emphasizes forming a work pattern of top-down and bottom-up connection, integration of departments and localities, and joint management.

"Persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is a systematic project; it is necessary to plan and advance the Party's political construction, ideological construction, organizational construction, work style construction, discipline construction, institutional construction, and the fight against corruption as an organic whole, and strive to improve the system for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party," emphasized General Secretary Xi Jinping.

Striving to strengthen the Party spirit of Communists is an urgent practical issue.

General Secretary Xi Jinping once pointed out: "Problems with cadres now mainly arise from 'virtue,' from weak Party spirit." The "Decision" points out that "a small number of Party members and cadres, including senior cadres, have weak Party spirit, wavering or even missing ideals and convictions, indifferent feelings toward the masses, and deviations in their view of political achievements..."

"Making the strengthening of Party spirit cultivation a lifelong subject," the Plenary Session proposed that Party members and cadres must work hard in six aspects: firmly establishing ideals and convictions, casting unwavering loyalty to the Party, deeply cultivating feelings for the people, adhering to seeking truth from facts, purifying moral character, and maintaining integrity and honesty.

To temper Party spirit, for Party members and cadres, the foremost task is to persist in using Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era to solidify the soul and forge the spirit, achieving the integration of learning, thinking, and application, and the unity of knowledge, belief, and action. It is necessary to "temper Party spirit in practice," be capable of shouldering the heavy task of national rejuvenation, and be firm actors and doers in Chinese modernization.

"Tempering Party spirit in practice," from the local level to the central level, General Secretary Xi Jinping has taken the lead by example. "I will be selfless, and live up to the people" shows his breadth of mind; "tears turn the tung trees into rain" reflects his feelings; "work style construction is always on the way, and there is never a rest stop" demonstrates his determination... These words profoundly interpret: "Party spirit and affinity to the people have always been consistent and unified."

Participating comrades unanimously agreed that it is necessary to further strengthen faith in Marxism, conviction in communism, and confidence in socialism with Chinese characteristics, achieving "devout and persistent, deeply believing and profound."

Since the 18th National Congress of the Party, focusing on "building the Party well and building it strong," strengthening Party spirit cultivation has been made an important part of the great new project of Party building in the new era, continuously endowing Xi Jinping's thought on Party building with new contemporary significance.

The 20th National Congress of the Party incorporated "simultaneously grasping Party spirit, work style, and discipline" and "enhancing Party spirit awareness" into the strategic deployment of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party; this Plenary Session has put forward new measures, "nourishing Party spirit with the Party's fine traditions and China's excellent traditional culture."

Studying the first and second volumes of the "Selected Works of Xi Jinping on Party Building," and thoroughly studying the first and second volumes of the "Selected Works of Xi Jinping on Culture," one finds many widely cited allusions: the admonition cast by Zheng Kaofu, a senior official of the Song state during the Spring and Autumn period, on the tripod in his family temple; the story of Yang Zhen of the Eastern Han Dynasty "refusing gold with the knowledge of the four" ... Party history stories, new era integrity culture, and the "second combination" are vividly applied to full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. The new realm of governing and managing the Party, rejuvenating and strengthening the Party in the new era is rooted in the five-thousand-year unbroken Chinese civilization, and is fundamentally due to the guidance of the Party's innovative theory.

"Rectify and solve the prominent problems facing Party building well"

Problems are the voice of the times, and "highlighting a problem-oriented approach" is one of the key points emphasized in the drafting of the "Decision."

"Take solving prominent problems within the Party as the focus, do not avoid contradictions, do not conceal illnesses and avoid medical treatment, and improve work standards in correcting deviations, rectifying chaos, and eliminating the turbid and promoting the clear."

Full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era has achieved historic and pioneering achievements, and the basic realization of Chinese modernization has entered a critical period. The "Decision," as a programmatic document for advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era, has attracted worldwide attention.

One still remembers that after the 18th National Congress of the Party, the warnings of the "four major tests" and the "four dangers" are still ringing in our ears. Turning the blade inward, using severe punishment to rectify chaos! The Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core "directly faced the grim reality of the once-weakened, virtualized, and diluted leadership of the Party, the lax, weak, and ineffective governance and management of the Party, and the shocking problems within the Party."

At the Plenary Session, General Secretary Xi Jinping proposed that the tasks of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party face three "more arduous" challenges: the task of the Party uniting and leading the people to safeguard national sovereignty, security, and development interests is more arduous; the task of the Party uniting and leading the people to promote reform and development and maintain social harmony and stability is more arduous; and the task of the Party maintaining its advanced nature and purity is more arduous.

This is a new major judgment made in response to the profound changes in the world situation, national conditions, and Party conditions, and the many new situations and new problems the Party faces. This major judgment is made from the strategic height of consolidating the Party's long-term governing position and realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, providing fundamental guidance for persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. At the same time, the "four major tests" and "four dangers" facing the Party are long-term, complex, and severe.

Full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is always on the way.

Being sober and firm — this is precisely the attitude of Chinese Communists toward problems. Only by adhering to a problem-oriented approach can the whole Party recognize the importance and urgency of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, enhance strategic resolve, and strengthen confidence in victory.

Among the seven principles of the "Decision," one is "adhering to a problem-oriented approach." When explaining this, the General Secretary hit the nail on the head: "The several parts of the draft 'Decision' are not laid out flatly and comprehensively according to the overall layout of Party building, but rather are planned and arranged by grasping key essentials and focusing on prominent problems."

Aiming at the target, applying targeted measures. As General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized in his explanation, "When planning ideas and measures, adhere to solving whatever problems exist, and focusing on solving whichever problems are most prominent, identify the crux of the problems, conduct in-depth research and argumentation, and propose targeted countermeasures."

Some people once waited and watched, wondering whether full and rigorous self-governance of the Party would be a passing fad. Practice has proven that the intensity has not diminished, it is cautious to the end, and it is always on the way. The Plenary Session released a clear signal: "adhere to the strict tone" and "must be carried through consistently and strictly to the end."

This is a persistence written on the long scroll of time.

People clearly remember the commitment made by General Secretary Xi Jinping at the meeting between the Standing Committee of the 18th Political Bureau of the Central Committee and Chinese and foreign journalists: "Our responsibility is to work together with all comrades of the Party to adhere to the Party governing the Party and governing the Party strictly."

In December 2014, "full and rigorous self-governance of the Party" was first proposed and incorporated into the the Four-Pronged Comprehensive Strategy (四个全面) strategic layout. Since then, the Sixth Plenary Session of the 18th Central Committee of the Party has specially studied the issue of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party; the 19th National Congress of the Party established "adhering to full and rigorous self-governance of the Party" as one of the basic strategies for upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era; the Sixth Plenary Session of the 19th Central Committee of the Party listed "clarifying the strategic policy of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party" as an important part of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era; the 20th National Congress of the Party systematically deployed "unswervingly advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party and deepening the great new project of Party building in the new era."

Unswervingly advancing, a series of achievements in theoretical innovation, practical innovation, and institutional innovation have been made, and a system for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party has been constructed.

Grasping it through to the end with the force of a thunderbolt has established a good reputation and won people's hearts, and has also made foreign media marvel that the Communist Party of China's anti-corruption achievements are "a huge contribution comparable to solving the problem of food and clothing and greatly eliminating poverty in China, the world's most populous country."

This is a firm choice looking toward the future.

The second plenary meeting was held on the afternoon of the 29th, and General Secretary Xi Jinping once again emphasized "further enhancing the understanding of the importance and urgency of persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party." He narrated the problems, going deeper layer by layer, analyzing them in detail, clarifying understanding, and building consensus.

General Secretary Xi Jinping addressed some people's doubts: "Does full and rigorous self-governance of the Party hinder economic and social development, or does it safeguard and promote economic and social development?"

"Since the 18th National Congress of the Party, the cause of the Party and the state has achieved historic achievements and undergone historic changes, and full and rigorous self-governance of the Party has played a fundamental safeguarding role."

"If full and rigorous self-governance of the Party has any impact on economic and social development, then this impact is positive rather than negative. Because full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is about supporting the upright and eliminating the evil, clearing away silt and removing obstacles, correcting deviations and rectifying chaos, resolutely rectifying all unhealthy tendencies and corrupt practices, protecting a fair and competitive market environment, stimulating the positive energy of doing business and starting undertakings, and stopping harmful economic behaviors that mix in illegal interests and harm the fundamental interests of the people."

General Secretary Xi Jinping's voice echoed through the venue: "Facing the future, no matter what difficulties we encounter, no matter how great the trials of wind and waves we endure, we must maintain our resolve, strengthen our confidence, and consistently advance full and rigorous self-governance of the Party without the slightest hesitation or retreat."

"Determined to pursue truth, always keeping the direction of progress correct," originating from the departure of the Red Boat, opened up by the great expedition, running through the different historical periods of revolution, construction, and reform, and in the magnificent new era, accumulating strength and gaining momentum.

"The Plenary Session decided that the 21st National Congress of the Communist Party of China will be held in Beijing in the second half of 2027. The Plenary Session believes that the 21st National Congress of the Party is a very important congress to be held during the critical period of basically realizing socialist modernization and on the new journey toward the Second Centenary Goal, and is a major event in the political life of the Party and the state."

The new journey is the new Long March of the Party and the people. "Thoroughly studying and implementing the spirit of the Plenary Session is a major political task for the whole Party at present and for a period to come." Under the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, the whole Party has always maintained unified thinking, firm will, coordinated action, and strong combat effectiveness. By persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, it will surely continue to create a new situation in governing and managing the Party, rejuvenating and strengthening the Party in the new era, and strive to create new brilliance on the new Long March.

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Fully Implement Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building

By: 本报评论员

The great cause has opened a new chapter, and the great project must create a new situation.

The Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party, from the strategic height of the overall development of the Party and the country's undertakings, comprehensively summarized the great achievements and valuable experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, deeply analyzed the new situation, new tasks, and new challenges facing Party building, and deliberated and adopted the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning Persistently Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party." This is a programmatic document for continuously advancing the new great project of Party building in the new era, reflecting the historical initiative of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core to strengthen the Party and the country, and it will surely powerfully mobilize and inspire the whole Party to strengthen confidence, maintain resolve, and continuously create a new situation in governing and managing the Party, and revitalizing and strengthening the Party in the new era.

In the new era, the determination for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party has been unprecedented (前所未有, qian suo wei you - "before, has, not, have"), and the intensity has been unprecedented (unprecedented, qian suo wei you - "before, has, not, have"). The Party has found the second answer to escaping the historical cycle of rise and fall, order and chaos, opened a new realm of self-revolution for a century-old major party, and through revolutionary tempering has become stronger and more capable. Party conduct, government conduct, and social atmosphere have taken on a completely new appearance (焕然一新, huan ran yi xin - "glow, change, one, new"), forming a new atmosphere of the governance of the Communist Party of China and the governance of China.

The achievement of these results is fundamentally due to the leading and steering the direction (领航掌舵, ling hang zhang duo - "lead, sail, hold, helm") of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, and to the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era. This fully demonstrates that the Two Establishments (两个确立) are the greatest certainty, the greatest confidence, and the greatest guarantee for us in overcoming all difficulties and obstacles (战胜一切艰难险阻, zhan sheng yi qie jian nan xian zu - "win, overcome, all, difficult, dangerous, obstacles") and responding to all uncertainties.

Over the past 105 years, the key reason the Party has always grasped historical initiative and continuously created miracles lies in its excellent qualities such as vowing to pursue (矢志追求, shi zhi zhui qiu - "aim, will, pursue, seek") truth, and in its possession of the scientific theoretical guidance of Marxism.

As the chapter on Party building of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building profoundly answers the major issue of the times of "what kind of long-term governing Marxist party to build and how to build a long-term governing Marxist party," enriching and developing the Marxist theory of Party building. It is a major achievement of adhering to the Two Integrations (两个结合) in advancing the Party's theoretical innovation, a crystallization of the practical experience and collective wisdom of the Party and the people, and has major practical significance and long-term guiding significance for strengthening the Party and the country.

Thought is like a torch, illuminating the new road of the examination and leading a more magnificent journey.

The most distinctive feature of the "Decision" is the comprehensive implementation of Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building, running it through as a main thread of thought, and fully implementing it in the framework arrangement of the document, in summarizing achievements and experience, in analyzing the situation and tasks, in clarifying the guiding ideology and the major principles of the "Seven Upholds," and in proposing policy measures. This is a full application of the valuable experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, reflecting the deepening of our Party's understanding of the laws of governing a Marxist ruling party, and will surely powerfully promote the governance and management of the Party and the revitalization and strengthening of the Party to innovate while upholding fundamentals and to develop while inheriting.

Here, explanations are provided around "strengthening the Party spirit of Communists" and "strictly implementing and carrying out democratic centralism," in order to deepen understanding and grasp of the spirit of the Plenary Session.

Strengthening Party spirit is the fundamental task of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and tempering Party spirit is a lifelong topic for Party members and cadres. "Persisting in tempering a strong Party spirit" is an important part of Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building.

From unswervingly using the Party's new theoretical innovations in the new era to consolidate the soul and forge the heart, and tempering the political character of loyalty to the Party, to incorporating "persisting in grasping Party spirit, Party conduct, and Party discipline together" and "enhancing Party spirit awareness" into the strategic deployment of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and nurturing fine conduct with a strong Party spirit, to solidly carrying out study and education on establishing and practicing a correct view of political achievements, and persisting in finding gaps, tracing roots, and strengthening cultivation from the perspective of Party spirit...

It is precisely because of clearing up the source and correcting the origin (正本清源, zheng ben qing yuan - "correct, root, clear, source") and strengthening the foundation and vital energy (固本培元, gu ben pei yuan - "solidify, root, cultivate, origin") ideologically, building a solid foundation of faith, replenishing the calcium of spirit, and steadying the rudder of thought, that our Party has always been at the forefront of the times amid ever-changing and unpredictable situations (风云变幻, feng yun bian huan - "wind, cloud, change, transform"), and has always been the mainstay of the people of the whole country amid fierce winds and high waves (风高浪急, feng gao lang ji - "wind, high, wave, urgent").

Among the strategic tasks and major measures deployed by the Plenary Session to persistently advance full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, the first is "strengthening the Party spirit of Communists." The purpose is precisely to promote all Party members and cadres to uphold the Party's nature and purpose, enhance Party consciousness, Party member consciousness, and vanguard consciousness, always maintain the political character of Communists, deeply understand the decisive significance of the Two Establishments, and resolutely achieve the Two Upholds (两个维护).

Our Party is the world's largest governing party, established under the guidance of the Marxist theory of Party building and in accordance with the principle of democratic centralism. Democratic centralism is the Party's fundamental organizational principle and leadership system, and implementing and carrying out democratic centralism is an inherent requirement of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party.

How can the political advantages, organizational advantages, institutional advantages, and work advantages of democratic centralism be better brought into play? The foremost is to uphold and strengthen the centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee.

In formulating and implementing the five-year plan, the Party Central Committee sets the direction, plans the overall situation, and makes decisions, insisting on promoting democracy and pooling wisdom to increase benefits (集思广益, ji si guang yi - "collect, thought, expand, benefit"), and "once decided, grasping implementation";

In promoting the development of the Yangtze Economic Belt, all regions and departments unswervingly implement the decisions and deployments of the Party Central Committee, jointly focusing on major protection and refraining from major development, and "unswervingly following the path of prioritizing ecological conservation and green development."

The Party's leadership is the most essential feature of socialism with Chinese characteristics and the greatest advantage of the socialist system with Chinese characteristics. "Upholding the Party's leadership, first of all, means upholding the authority of the Party Central Committee and its centralized, unified leadership; this is the highest principle of the Party's leadership."

The Plenary Session made deployments around strictly implementing and carrying out democratic centralism. We must uphold and strengthen the centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee, fully promote intra-Party democracy, effectively implement correct centralism, raise the level of scientific, democratic, and law-based decision-making, and ensure that the Party always has strong creativity, cohesion, and combat effectiveness.

Having weathered storms without changing its original aspiration, with firm goals and courageous progress, the Party, uniting and leading hundreds of millions of people, is advancing toward great rejuvenation with unstoppable steps. Deeply studying and implementing the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party is a major political task for the whole Party at present and for a period to come. By conscientiously studying and implementing the spirit of the Plenary Session and adhering to the guidance of Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building, our Party will surely always remain steadfast in its steps and full of vigor, leading the great cause of Chinese modernization to continuously move forward.

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Li Qiang Chairs Meeting of State Council Party Leadership Group

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) On October 30, Li Qiang, Premier of the State Council and Secretary of the Party Leadership Group, presided over a meeting of the Party Leadership Group of the State Council to study and implement General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech and the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China.

The meeting pointed out that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee was a historic meeting held at a critical juncture in China's development, fully reflecting the historical initiative of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core to strengthen the Party and the country, and demonstrating the firm determination and clear attitude to carry the Party's great self-revolution through to the end. The work report and important speech made by General Secretary Xi Jinping at the plenary session summarized the new achievements made in the various undertakings of the Party and the state since the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee, and put forward clear requirements for implementing the spirit of the plenary session and doing all aspects of work well. The "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning Unswerving Persistence in Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party" reviewed and adopted at the plenary session, guided by Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, comprehensively implements Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, summarizes the great achievements and valuable experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, analyzes the situation and tasks facing Party management and Party discipline, the revitalization and strengthening of the Party in the current and future period, and clarifies the overall requirements and main tasks for unswerving persistence in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. It is a programmatic document for continuously advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era. The Party Leadership Group of the State Council and all departments of the State Council must regard the study and implementation of the spirit of the plenary session as a major political task for the current and future period, consciously unify their thoughts and actions with the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech and the arrangements of the plenary session, and implement the various tasks of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party with higher standards and more concrete measures.

The meeting pointed out that it is necessary to deeply study Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, implement the requirements of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party throughout all aspects and the entire process of government work, uphold and strengthen the centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee, improve the implementation mechanism for the Party Central Committee's major decisions and arrangements, strengthen follow-up supervision and quality and effectiveness evaluation, and unswervingly serve as the executor, action-oriented doer, and practical worker in implementing the Party Central Committee's decisions and arrangements. It is necessary to provide strong guarantees for promoting development with more forceful measures for Party management and Party discipline, plan, deploy, and advance the implementation of the requirements of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party together with economic and social development work, persistently rectify work styles, enforce discipline, and combat corruption, strictly regulate administrative conduct, encourage cadres to enhance their capabilities and take on responsibilities, and create a sound development environment. It is necessary to fulfill the political responsibility for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, strictly implement the responsibility system for Party management and Party discipline, prevent risks and plug loopholes in a targeted manner through establishing rules and regulations and improving mechanisms, effectively grasp Party management and Party discipline work in a concrete and in-depth manner, and transform the results of Party management and Party discipline into a powerful force for promoting work.

Ding Xuexiang, He Lifeng, Zhang Guoqing, Liu Guozhong, Wang Xiaohong, Wu Zhenglong, and Shen Yiqin attended the meeting.

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Li Qiang and Zhao Leji Meet Separately with German President Steinmeier

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) On the morning of October 30, Premier Li Qiang of the State Council met at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who is in China for a state visit.

Li Qiang stated that, through the joint efforts of both sides, China-Germany cooperation is developing vigorously, bringing more benefits to the peoples of both countries. Reviewing the course of China-Germany relations, a very important lesson is that both sides have adhered to mutual respect, seeking common ground while reserving differences (求同存异, qiu tong cun yi - "seek same, preserve difference"), focusing on cooperation, and pursuing mutual benefit and win-win outcomes. At present, unilateralism and protectionism are clamorous and widespread (甚嚣尘上, shen xiao chen shang - "very noisy, dust rises"). China and Germany should demonstrate greater sense of responsibility, firmly safeguard free trade, promote open cooperation, and continuously achieve new progress in the comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries. President Xi Jinping will hold a meeting with the President, further planning the development of China-Germany relations. China is willing to strengthen strategic communication with Germany, consolidate political mutual trust, enhance the quality and effectiveness of cooperation, better benefit the peoples of both countries, and inject more stability and positive energy into the world. We are full of confidence in China-Germany win-win cooperation and common development.

Li Qiang pointed out that China is willing to make good use of dialogue mechanisms such as the intergovernmental consultations between the two countries with Germany, leverage each other's strengths, expand cooperation in fields such as automobiles, chemicals, artificial intelligence, digital economy, and green development, and move toward a higher level of mutual benefit and win-win outcomes. The two sides should continue to share market opportunities. China is willing to import more high-quality products from Germany and welcomes German enterprises to actively explore the Chinese market. China supports more Chinese enterprises in investing in Germany and hopes that Germany will provide a fair, stable, and predictable business environment for enterprises. China is willing to expand two-way people-to-people exchanges with Germany, deepen exchanges in culture, education, youth, sports, and sub-national fields, and consolidate the popular foundation for friendly cooperation between the two countries. Germany is an important member of the European Union, and China hopes that Germany will play a constructive role in the development of China-EU relations.

Steinmeier stated that China's economic and social development and technological progress are changing with each passing day (日新月异, ri xin yue yi - "day new, month change") and are admirable. Germany and China have long maintained a good partnership, and the economic and trade cooperation between the two countries is successful and mutually beneficial. The cooperation between German and Chinese enterprises not only benefits both countries but is also crucial to the world. Germany is committed to deepening cooperation with China in the spirit of respect, trust, and mutual benefit, supporting enterprises of both countries in learning from each other and achieving common success, while insisting on properly resolving differences through dialogue.

Wu Zhenglong attended the meeting.

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) On the morning of October 30, Zhao Leji, Chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, met in Beijing with German President Steinmeier.

Zhao Leji stated that China and Germany have always adhered to mutual respect and trust (互尊互信, hu zun hu xin - "mutual respect, mutual trust"), seeking common ground while reserving differences, and mutually beneficial cooperation, and the bilateral relations are mature and resilient. China is willing to work with Germany to implement the important consensus of the heads of state of the two countries, share development opportunities, jointly promote open cooperation, jointly safeguard peace and tranquility, and continuously enrich the connotation of the China-Germany comprehensive strategic partnership. The National People's Congress of China is willing to strengthen exchanges and interactions with the German parliament and provide legal safeguards for practical cooperation. Members of the German parliament and the European Parliament are welcome to visit China more often to understand a true, multi-dimensional, developing, and progressing China.

Steinmeier stated that Germany-China relations are full of vitality, with broad and rich areas of cooperation. Facing the new situation, the two sides should strengthen dialogue, deepen cooperation, properly handle differences, and achieve win-win outcomes. It is hoped that the legislative bodies of the two countries will further strengthen exchanges and interactions.

Zhang Qingwei attended the meeting.

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NPC Standing Committee Party Leadership Group Holds Meeting

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) The Party Leadership Group of the NPC Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China held a meeting on the 30th to convey and study General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech and the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee, and to study implementation measures in light of the actual work of the people's congresses. Zhao Leji, member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, Chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, and Secretary of the Party Leadership Group, presided over the meeting and delivered a speech.

The meeting held that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee was an important meeting convened at the significant juncture of the 105th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, at a critical period for the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, and in the opening year of the 15th Five-Year Plan. The plenary session fully affirmed the work of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee since the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee, noting that the cause of the Party and the state has made new progress and achieved new results, further demonstrating the decisive significance of the Two Establishments (两个确立) and enhancing the ideological, political, and action consciousness of achieving the Two Upholds (两个维护). The "Decision of the CPC Central Committee on Several Major Issues Concerning Persisting in the Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party" reviewed and adopted at the plenary session thoroughly implements Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, comprehensively summarizes the achievements and experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, deeply analyzes the situation and tasks facing Party building, and makes strategic arrangements for governing and managing the Party, revitalizing and strengthening the Party for the current and future period. It is a programmatic document for advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era. General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech profoundly expounds the major issues of why and how to persist in something continuously (持之以恒, chi zhi yi heng - "hold on, continue, with, persistent") in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, puts forward clear requirements for grasping key arrangements and ensuring implementation, and provides fundamental guidance for studying and implementing the spirit of the plenary session and deeply advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era.

The meeting emphasized that the Party Leadership Group of the NPC Standing Committee, the Party Leadership Groups of the various special committees, and the Party Leadership Group of the General Office must consciously unify their thinking and actions with the spirit of the plenary session, seriously study implementation measures, and ensure that the plenary session's arrangements are fully implemented. They must carry the in-depth study and implementation of Xi Jinping's thought on Party building through to the end, systematically study and comprehend the core essence, rich connotations, and practical requirements of Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, examine themselves, their duties, and their work in light of it, deepen practical application, and enhance the effectiveness of study. They must conduct in-depth investigations into problems existing in the Party building and work of the people's congresses, and, in conjunction with rectification of issues identified in inspections and rectification of issues identified in centralized education campaigns within the Party, promote the effective resolution of problems and the improvement and perfection of institutions. They must strictly implement primary responsibility, build strong organizations, and manage the ranks well. Comrades of the Party Leadership Group must be strict with themselves, strictly assume their responsibilities, and strictly manage what is under their purview.

The meeting pointed out that high-quality Party building must lead the high-quality development of the work of the people's congresses. Uphold the Party's overall leadership over the work of the people's congresses, and implement the Party's propositions and accomplish the Party's tasks through law-based performance of duties. Uphold the organic unity of law-based governance and rule-based governance of the Party, and do a good job in legislative work such as formulating the Anti-Cross-Border Corruption Law. Uphold the leading role of intra-Party supervision, promote the deep integration of the supervision of the people's congresses with supervision from all other aspects, and form a combined force. Strengthen the ideological and political guidance and the construction of work style and discipline for deputies to the people's congresses, and support deputies in performing their duties in accordance with the law, in an orderly and standardized manner.

Li Hongzhong, member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Deputy Secretary of the Party Leadership Group of the NPC Standing Committee, and members of the Party Leadership Group of the NPC Standing Committee Wang Dongming, Xiao Jie, Tie Ning, Peng Qinghua, Zhang Qingwei, Losang Jamcan, Shohrat Zakir, and Liu Qi attended the meeting.

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CPC National Committee of the CPPCC Holds Meeting

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) The CPC National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) held a meeting on the 30th to convey and study the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee. Wang Huning, member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, chairman of the CPPCC National Committee, and secretary of the Party Group, presided over the meeting and delivered a speech.

The meeting held that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee was a very important meeting convened at a critical juncture in basically realizing socialist modernization. The important speech delivered by General Secretary Xi Jinping at the plenary session and the "Decision of the CPC Central Committee on Several Major Issues Concerning Persistently Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party" adopted at the session profoundly summarized the great achievements made in full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, profoundly analyzed the situation and tasks facing Party building in the current and future periods, and made strategic arrangements for persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, fully reflecting the tremendous political courage and strong sense of responsibility of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core in governing and managing the Party and in revitalizing and strengthening the Party. This is of major practical significance and long-term guiding significance for consolidating the Party's long-term governing position and fulfilling the Party's missions and tasks.

The meeting held that since the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has united and led the entire Party and people of all ethnic groups across the country in striving for progress with determination (锐意进取, rui yi jin qu - "sharp, intent, advance") and fighting bravely and vigorously (奋勇拼搏, fen yong pin bo - "brave, courageous, struggle"), achieving a successful conclusion of the 14th Five-Year Plan and a good start to the 15th Five-Year Plan, and making new progress and new achievements in the cause of the Party and the state. Since the 18th CPC National Congress, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has been unswerving and steadfast (坚定不移, jian ding bu yi - "firm, steadfast, not, move") in exercising full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, opening up a new realm of self-revolution for a century-old major party, and promoting historic achievements and historic changes in the cause of the Party and the state, enabling the Party and the people to win the historical initiative in strengthening the Party and the country. It is necessary to deeply comprehend the decisive significance of the Two Establishments (两个确立) and resolutely achieve the Two Upholds (两个维护), and effectively unify thoughts and actions with the spirit of the plenary session.

The meeting emphasized that Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building is an important component of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, providing fundamental guidance and a guide to action for deeply advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era. Party organizations at all levels of the CPPCC National Committee should regard the in-depth study, implementation, and dissemination of the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee as a major political task, thoroughly study and deeply comprehend Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building, thoroughly study and deeply comprehend the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech and the requirements of the arrangements in the "Decision," and set off an upsurge in the CPPCC National Committee of studying, publicizing, and implementing the spirit of the plenary session. It is necessary to adhere to taking the Party's political construction as the guide to comprehensively advance all aspects of Party building in the CPPCC, unremittingly use the Party's innovative theories to unite hearts and forge souls, strengthen the Party spirit of Communists, strictly implement democratic centralism, strengthen the political and organizational functions of Party organizations, persistently and unremittingly (锲而不舍, qie er bu she - "carve, and, not, abandon") implement the spirit of the Eight-Point Regulation of the Central Committee, promote the normalization and long-term effectiveness of work style improvement, consolidate and expand the achievements of study and education in establishing and practicing a correct view of political achievements, firmly grasp the "ox nose" of the responsibility system for governing and managing the Party, and implement the requirements of persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in a down-to-earth manner.

The meeting reviewed and approved the "Work Plan of the Party Group of the CPPCC National Committee on Deeply Studying, Publicizing, and Implementing the Spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee."

Shi Taifeng and Hu Chunhua, deputy secretaries of the Party Group of the CPPCC National Committee, and Party Group members Shen Yueyue, Wang Yong, Zhou Qiang, Bater, Mu Hong, Xian Hui, Wang Dongfeng, and Jiang Xinzhi attended the meeting and delivered speeches. Responsible comrades of the Party Group members of the organs of the CPPCC National Committee and of the sub-Party Groups of the various special committees attended the meeting.

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Li Xi Chairs Meeting of the Standing Committee of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) The Standing Committee of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the 20th Central Committee held a meeting on October 30 to convey, study, and implement the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee. Li Xi, member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Secretary of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, presided over the meeting. He emphasized that discipline inspection and supervision organs should conscientiously study and implement the spirit of the Plenary Session, thoroughly study and implement Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building, deeply comprehend the decisive significance of the Two Establishments (两个确立), resolutely achieve the Two Upholds (两个维护), effectively unify thoughts and actions with the Party Central Committee's decisions and arrangements, promote high-quality development of discipline inspection and supervision work with higher standards and more concrete measures, persevering with constancy (持之以恒, chi zhi yi heng - "hold, continue, one, constant") in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and provide strong guarantees for comprehensively advancing the building of a strong country and the great cause of national rejuvenation through Chinese modernization.

Li Xi pointed out that since the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee, in the face of complex and intricate domestic and international situations, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has united and led the entire Party and people of all ethnic groups across the country, striving for progress with determination (锐意进取, rui yi jin qu - "sharp, intent, advance"), working hard and striving tenaciously, promoting the successful conclusion of the 14th Five-Year Plan and a good start to the 15th Five-Year Plan, and achieving new progress and new results in the cause of the Party and the state. The fundamental reason for these achievements lies in General Secretary Xi Jinping's helm and leadership, and in the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era. Discipline inspection and supervision organs should unite more closely around the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, unify thinking, unify will, unify action, and steadfastly advance courageously along the direction guided by General Secretary Xi Jinping.

Li Xi emphasized that the "Decision of the CPC Central Committee on Several Major Issues Concerning Persevering with Constancy in Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party" adopted by the Plenary Session is a programmatic document for continuously advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era. Discipline inspection and supervision organs should completely, accurately, and comprehensively study and grasp the spirit of the "Decision," deeply grasp the great achievements of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, deeply grasp the major significance, overall requirements, and strategic deployments of persevering with constancy in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and effectively enhance their sense of responsibility and mission in doing the work well. They should deeply grasp the essence, essential meaning, and practical requirements of Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building, grasp the standpoints, viewpoints, and methods running through it, and consciously use it to guide all work of discipline inspection and supervision.

Li Xi emphasized that discipline inspection and supervision organs, as an important force in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, should take the lead in studying and implementing the spirit of the Plenary Session, strengthen organizational leadership, refine goals and tasks, clarify division of responsibilities, continuously track and follow up on results, and implement all arrangements of the Plenary Session with the spirit of hammering nails. They should persevere with constancy in strengthening political supervision to ensure the implementation of major decisions and arrangements of the Party Central Committee; persevere with constancy in implementing the spirit of the Eight-Point Regulation of the Central Committee to promote the normalization and long-term effectiveness of work style improvement; persevere with constancy in strictly enforcing Party discipline and rules, comprehensively giving play to the roles of discipline education in restraint, guarantee, and encouragement; persevere with constancy in advancing in an integrated manner the efforts to ensure that officials do not dare to be corrupt, cannot be corrupt, and do not want to be corrupt, continuously eradicating the soil and conditions for corruption to breed, and firmly following the path of anti-corruption with Chinese characteristics; persevere with constancy in advancing the standardization, rule-of-law-based, and professional development of discipline inspection and supervision work, and building an iron force of discipline inspection and supervision that is "excellent in four aspects."

Liu Jinguo, Secretary of the Secretariat of the CPC Central Committee and Deputy Secretary of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, attended the meeting.

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NPC Standing Committee's Legislative Affairs Commission Briefs on Draft Laws Scheduled for Review

By: 本报记者 魏哲哲

On October 30, the Legislative Affairs Commission of the NPC Standing Committee held a press conference, at which spokesperson Huang Haihua introduced the main situation of the draft laws to be considered at the 25th session of the Standing Committee of the 14th National People's Congress, and answered reporters' questions.

The 25th session of the Standing Committee of the 14th National People's Congress will consider the draft Procuratorial Public Interest Litigation Law, the draft Antarctic Activities and Environmental Protection Law, the draft revised Water Law, the draft Anti-Cross-Border Corruption Law, the draft State-Owned Assets Law, and the draft Financial Law; consider the proposal submitted by the Council of Chairmen of the NPC Standing Committee regarding the deliberation of the draft amendment to the Criminal Procedure Law; consider the proposal submitted by the NPC Environment and Resources Protection Committee regarding the deliberation of the draft amendment to the Renewable Energy Law; and consider the proposals submitted by the State Council regarding the deliberation of the draft amendment to the Tax Collection Administration Law and regarding the deliberation of the draft amendment package for 15 laws including the Emergency Response Law.

Huang Haihua introduced that the third reading draft of the Procuratorial Public Interest Litigation Law is proposed to improve the areas of cases covered by procuratorial public interest litigation; improve jurisdiction and trial procedures, and ensure proper coordination with relevant procedural laws; optimize pre-litigation procedures for civil public interest litigation; and enrich the provisions on supervision over procuratorial public interest litigation work.

National Antarctic expedition activities are of great significance for better understanding, protecting, and utilizing Antarctica. Huang Haihua said that, in order to further strengthen the management and regulation of national Antarctic expedition activities, the draft Antarctic Activities and Environmental Protection Law makes the following provisions: First, the general provisions clarify that the state establishes and improves the Antarctic expedition system. Second, it clarifies that the marine administrative department of the State Council is responsible for formulating national Antarctic expedition plans and annual programs, and for organizing and carrying out national Antarctic expedition activities. Third, it strengthens the construction of infrastructure such as national Antarctic research stations, and enhances the capacity for Antarctic activities and safety guarantees. Fourth, it provides that tourists who visit national Antarctic research stations and their facilities during Antarctic tourism activities shall comply with the relevant provisions of the marine administrative department of the State Council, shall not interfere with national Antarctic expedition activities, and corresponding legal liability is provided.

The draft revised Water Law takes promoting water conservation and the recycling of water resources as the focus of the revision: First, it clarifies that the state adheres to and implements the policy of giving priority to water conservation, implements the national water conservation action, strengthens agricultural, industrial, and urban water conservation, establishes incentive and constraint mechanisms, and comprehensively builds a water-conserving society. Second, it clarifies that the state establishes and improves a water pricing formation mechanism that is compatible with the level of economic and social development, water resource conditions, water supply costs, the affordability of water users, and water conservation requirements, so as to promote the intensive and economical use of water resources. Third, it adds provisions to bring unconventional water sources such as collected and stored rainwater, seawater and desalinated seawater, mine (pit) water, and brackish water into the unified allocation of water resources. Fourth, it requires that local people's governments at or above the county level shall take measures to encourage the use of reclaimed water that meets prescribed standards, and that water use for urban greening and other purposes shall give priority to the use of reclaimed water.

Huang Haihua introduced that, with regard to the second reading draft of the Anti-Cross-Border Corruption Law, the following main modifications are proposed: First, enrich the principles of anti-cross-border corruption work, clarifying that such work shall "adhere to the holistic approach to national security" and "strictly follow the Constitution and laws, comply with statutory procedures, and respect and safeguard human rights." Second, add provisions to strengthen the protection of state secrets, work secrets, commercial secrets, personal information, and personal privacy. Third, clarify that domestic enterprises engaged in cross-border business operations shall, based on factors such as enterprise size, business scope, and risk prevention and control, reasonably establish integrity and compliance management departments or personnel.

The second reading draft of the State-Owned Assets Law is proposed to clarify that state-owned assets management and supervision work adheres to coordinating development and security, and safeguards the consolidation and development of the state-owned economy; improve the relevant provisions on the management of overseas state-owned assets; improve the relevant provisions on the performance of the duties of owners of state-owned assets by the central and local governments, and by governments and authorized departments; improve the relevant provisions on the compensated use and rational allocation of state-owned natural resource assets; improve the relevant provisions on the basic management of state-owned assets; and further enrich the relevant provisions on the management of income from state-owned assets.

The second reading draft of the Financial Law is proposed to enrich the relevant systems for the protection of the rights and interests of financial consumers and investors; strengthen the unified regulation of asset management products and services; add targeted provisions on activities such as internet marketing; and strengthen the supervision of cross-border financial activities.

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The State Council appoints and removes state personnel

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) The State Council appoints and removes state personnel.

Wang Shouli is appointed Deputy Director of the State Ethnic Affairs Commission; Zhang Li is appointed Deputy Representative of the People's Republic of China for International Trade Negotiations (at the vice-ministerial level); Feng Pengzhi is appointed Dean of Education of the Chinese Academy of Governance (at the vice-ministerial level).

Li Zhong is removed from the post of Vice Minister of Human Resources and Social Security; Qin Haixiang is removed from the post of Vice Minister of Housing and Urban-Rural Development; Zhang Li is removed from the post of Assistant Minister of Commerce; Chen Ronghui is removed from the post of Deputy Director of the National Data Administration.

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Xie Weijiang appointed acting governor of Hunan

(Xinhua News Agency, Changsha, October 30) The 26th session of the Standing Committee of the 14th Hunan Provincial People's Congress decided on October 30: to accept the request of Shen Xiaoming to resign from the post of chairman of the Standing Committee of the Hunan Provincial People's Congress, to accept the request of Mao Weiming to resign from the post of governor of the Hunan Provincial People's Government, and to appoint Xie Weijiang as vice governor and acting governor of the Hunan Provincial People's Government.

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Zhuge Yujie appointed acting governor of Qinghai Province

(Xinhua News Agency, Xining, October 30) The 25th session of the Standing Committee of the 14th People's Congress of Qinghai Province decided on October 30: to accept Luo Dongchuan's request to resign from the post of Governor of the People's Government of Qinghai Province, and to appoint Zhuge Yujie as Vice Governor and Acting Governor of the People's Government of Qinghai Province.

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Page 1 editors: Yang Xu, Luan Xinyi, Zhao Chuanbo; Page 2 editors: Lin Lin, Qi Jiarun, Guo Xueyan; Page 3 editors: Yuan Zhenxi, Liu Jingwen, Zhang Xueyan; Page 4 editors: Han Xiaoming, Jiang Bo, Guan Haoyu

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Persist in Full and Rigorous Party Self-Governance with Higher Standards and More Concrete Measures

By: 本报记者 孟祥夫

From October 26 to 29, the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee was held in Beijing. This was an important meeting convened at a critical juncture marking the 105th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China and at a critical period for the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. The Plenary Session reviewed and adopted the Decision of the CPC Central Committee on Several Major Issues Concerning Continuing to Persist in Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party (hereinafter referred to as the Decision), successfully completing all items on its agenda.

On October 30, the CPC Central Committee held a press conference to introduce and interpret the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee.

The most important achievement of the Plenary Session was the review and adoption of the Decision.

Our Party is committed to the eternal cause of the Chinese nation, and Party building bears on the future and destiny of the Party and on the rise and fall, success and failure of the cause of the Party and the state.

"The most important achievement of the Plenary Session was the review and adoption of the Decision," said Tang Fangyu, director of the Central Policy Research Office. The drafting of the Decision was carried out under the leadership of the Party Central Committee. General Secretary Xi Jinping served as head of the document drafting group, personally planning, providing overall guidance, and setting the direction, devoting tremendous effort to the drafting of the document and playing a decisive role. The drafting of the document fully promoted democracy, extensively pooled consensus, and concentrated the wisdom of the whole Party, fully reflecting the common will of the whole Party and the common expectations of the people of the whole country.

Tang Fangyu said, "The Decision is divided into three major parts. The first part is the general introduction, elaborating on the importance, urgency, and overall requirements of continuing to persist in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. The second part is the specific provisions, laying out the strategic tasks of continuing to persist in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, including seven sections: strengthening the Party spirit of Communists; strictly implementing and enforcing democratic centralism; forging a high-caliber cadre contingent capable of shouldering the heavy task of national rejuvenation; building a rigorous organizational system that is connected from top to bottom and strong in execution; making unremitting effort to rectify conduct and enforce discipline; unwaveringly advancing in an integrated manner the efforts to ensure that officials do not dare to be corrupt, cannot be corrupt, and do not want to be corrupt; and adhering to governing the Party with institutions and governing the Party in accordance with regulations. The third part makes arrangements on two aspects: improving the Party and state supervision systems and implementing the political responsibility for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party."

Tang Fangyu introduced that the Plenary Session mainly conveyed three signals: "First, it conveyed our Party's clear attitude and persistent pursuit, as a Marxist governing party, of upholding the Party's ideals, nature, and purposes. Second, it conveyed our Party's great ambitions and spirit of responsibility in comprehensively advancing the building of a strong country and the great cause of national rejuvenation through Chinese modernization. Third, it conveyed our Party's firm confidence and strong resolve to courageously face contradictions and problems head-on and to continue to persist in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party with higher standards and more concrete measures."

The Decision is a programmatic document for advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era.

The firm Party spirit of Chinese Communists is an important guarantee for our Party to maintain its advanced nature and purity and to improve its leadership level and governance capability.

"The Decision places 'strengthening the Party spirit of Communists' in the first part of the strategic task arrangements," said Hu Heping, executive deputy head of the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee. The Decision makes specific arrangements in five aspects: first, strengthening education in loyalty to the Party; second, persisting in using the Party's innovative theories to unify minds and strengthen spirit; third, cultivating Party spirit with the Party's fine traditions and the excellent traditional Chinese culture; fourth, tempering Party spirit through practice; and fifth, strengthening the identification and assessment of Party spirit.

Democratic centralism is the Party's fundamental organizational principle and leadership system, and it plays an important safeguarding role in maintaining the Party's centralized unity, effectively implementing the major decisions and arrangements of the Party Central Committee, and regulating the performance of duties and exercise of power by leading bodies and leading officials.

Hu Heping introduced that the Decision takes strict implementation and enforcement of democratic centralism as an important focal point of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and makes specific arrangements in four aspects: first, upholding and strengthening the centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee; second, improving the quality of intra-Party democracy; third, strictly implementing the rules of procedure for decision-making of leading bodies; and fourth, regulating the performance of duties and exercise of power by "top leaders."

Party organizations at all levels and Party members and officials are the subjects of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and are also the key force driving the development of the cause of the Party and the state.

Huang Jianfa, executive deputy head of the Organization Department of the CPC Central Committee, introduced that the Decision makes arrangements in six aspects for forging a high-caliber cadre contingent capable of shouldering the heavy task of national rejuvenation: first, upholding the correct orientation for selecting and appointing officials; second, selecting and appointing officials accurately and scientifically; third, promoting officials to establish and practice a correct view of political achievements; fourth, enhancing officials' abilities to start undertakings and create achievements; fifth, improving the quality of cultivating and selecting outstanding young officials; and sixth, strengthening the management and supervision of officials.

The Party's strength comes from organization. The Party's overall leadership and all of the Party's work must be realized through the Party's strong organizational system.

"The Decision points out: it is necessary to systematically advance the building of Party organizations at all levels and in all fields, strengthen the political and organizational functions of Party organizations, and ensure that the implementation of the Party's line, principles, and policies and the decisions and arrangements of the Party Central Committee is coordinated from top to bottom, precise, and efficient," Huang Jianfa introduced. The Decision makes arrangements in six aspects: first, giving play to the exemplary role of Party organizations in central and state organs; second, strengthening the functions of local Party committees; third, coordinating the advancement of the building of primary-level Party organizations in all fields; fourth, highlighting efforts to strengthen Party building in emerging fields; fifth, strengthening the building of the Party member contingent; and sixth, improving the mechanisms for connecting Party organizations at all levels.

Problems of work style are stubborn and recurrent, and rectifying conduct and enforcing discipline must be persistent and unremitting and require sustained, long-term effort.

"The Decision proposes to simultaneously address Party spirit, Party conduct, and Party discipline, and to integrate the rectification of conduct, the enforcement of discipline, and the fight against corruption," said Zhang Fuhai, deputy secretary of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and deputy director of the National Commission of Supervision. The Decision makes arrangements in five aspects: first, following the Party's mass line in the new era; second, persistently implementing the spirit of the Central Eight-Point Regulation; third, promoting the normalization and long-term effectiveness of work style improvement; fourth, strengthening strict enforcement of discipline; and fifth, comprehensively giving play to the constraining, safeguarding, and incentivizing roles of discipline education.

At present, the situation of the fight against corruption remains severe and complex, and the task of eradicating the soil and conditions that breed corruption remains arduous and heavy.

Zhang Fuhai introduced that the Decision emphasizes firmly following the path of anti-corruption with Chinese characteristics, and makes arrangements in four aspects: first, maintaining a high-pressure posture in punishing corruption; second, strengthening the restriction and supervision of the exercise of power; third, consolidating the ideological foundation of advocating integrity and rejecting corruption; and fourth, enhancing the comprehensive effectiveness of the integrated advancement of efforts to ensure that officials do not dare to be corrupt, cannot be corrupt, and do not want to be corrupt.

"With regard to further improving the Party and state supervision systems, this is an inevitable requirement for continuing to persist in advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party," Zhang Fuhai said. The relevant arrangements of the Decision mainly cover four aspects: first, making substantive the comprehensive supervision of Party committees (Party leadership groups); second, strengthening the coordinated connection of disciplinary supervision, supervisory supervision, dispatched supervision, and inspection supervision; third, improving the primary-level supervision system; and fourth, promoting the deep integration and efficient coordination of intra-Party supervision with supervision from all other quarters, forming a synergy of supervision.

Institutions govern the fundamentals and the long term. Strengthening the building of the system of intra-Party laws and regulations is a long-term and fundamental strategy for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party.

Xie Chuntao, executive deputy president of the Party School of the CPC Central Committee (National Academy of Governance), introduced that the Decision makes further arrangements in three aspects for adhering to governing the Party with institutions and governing the Party in accordance with regulations: first, improving the system of intra-Party laws and regulations; second, enhancing the enforcement of institutions; and third, vigorously breaking down hidden rules.

Xie Chuntao said that the Decision further clarifies the primary responsibility of Party committees (Party leadership groups), the supervisory responsibility of discipline inspection commissions, the responsibility of secretaries of Party committees (Party leadership groups) as the first responsible persons, the "dual responsibilities for one post" of other members of leading bodies, and the specific responsibilities of Party members and officials, and improves a responsibility system in which each bears their own responsibility and all are unified and coordinated.

Guiding officials to reform, innovate, and start undertakings while observing rules and discipline.

"Full and rigorous self-governance of the Party and encouraging officials to take on responsibilities and act are inherently unified. Being strict does not mean managing everyone to death, but rather, through clarifying direction, establishing rules, rectifying conduct, and strengthening immunity, forming a clean and upright intra-Party political ecology and creating a favorable environment conducive to starting undertakings and creating achievements," Huang Jianfa said. For officials, strict management is both an "incantation to rein them in" and a "protective talisman," and is truly being responsible for officials. Severely punishing corrupt and degenerated officials is also an encouragement and protection for good officials.

Huang Jianfa introduced that the Decision makes major arrangements for encouraging officials to take on responsibilities and act: first, upholding the correct orientation for selecting and appointing officials; second, improving the mechanism for assessing and evaluating officials; third, implementing various policies for caring for and showing concern for officials, especially primary-level officials; and fourth, improving the mechanisms for encouraging and protecting officials who take on responsibilities and act.

"The Decision emphasizes the need to seriously investigate and punish acts of false accusation and framing, and to promptly carry out work to clarify and restore reputations, precisely in order to truly take responsibility for those who take responsibility, be accountable for those who are accountable, and back up those who do things, so that the willingness to take responsibility, the courage to take responsibility, and the ability to take responsibility well become a widespread and natural trend," Huang Jianfa said.

Emphasizing building the Party ideologically and strengthening the Party theoretically is a distinctive feature of governing and managing the Party, and rejuvenating and strengthening the Party, in the new era.

"The most iconic, leading, and pioneering achievement of the Party's ideological development in the new era is the establishment of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, realizing a new leap in the Sinicization and modernization of Marxism," Hu Heping stated. "We hold high the banner of thought, comprehensively strengthen the armed force of the Party's innovative theories, continuously carry out study and education, publicity and interpretation, and research and elaboration, and promote the Party's innovative theories to take ever deeper root in the hearts of the people."

The Decision puts forward various key tasks for using the Party's innovative theories to unify minds and strengthen spirit in such aspects as study and education, research and elaboration, and practical application. Hu Heping stated that they will conscientiously implement the requirements of the Decision, enrich the methods of theoretical study and education, deepen systematic and theoretical research and elaboration, adhere to integrating theory with practice, and promote the whole Party to better use Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era to unify thinking, unify will, and unify action.

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Stay Confident and Steadfast, Persistently Advance Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party (Study and Implement the Spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee)

By: 本报记者 孟祥夫 王 嵘 何昭宇

From October 26 to 29, the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China was held in Beijing, reviewing and adopting the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning Persistently Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party" (hereinafter referred to as the "Decision"). During the session, some participating comrades accepted interviews with reporters. All expressed that, at the critical juncture of the 105th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China and the critical period of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, the "Decision" made by the Plenary Session on persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is a strategic deployment made with having a far-sighted strategic vision (高瞻远瞩, gao zhan yuan ju - "high, look far; far, see") by the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, focusing on improving the Party's long-term governance capacity, maintaining the Party's advanced nature and purity, and preserving the Party's flesh-and-blood ties with the masses. It fully demonstrates the historical initiative of the Party Central Committee to strengthen the Party and the country, and is of great milestone significance for strengthening Party building.

Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, with tremendous political courage and a strong sense of responsibility, has driven the new great project of Party building in the new era to develop in depth, continuously opening up new realms for the century-old Party in governing and managing the Party, and in revitalizing and strengthening the Party. Comrades participating in the session expressed that the historic and pioneering achievements of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era are fundamentally due to the helm-steering and command of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, and to the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era.

"The extraordinary journey of governance, Party management, and Party revitalization in the new era has been extraordinary and magnificent in scale (波澜壮阔, bo lan zhuang kuo - "wave, ripple, magnificent, vast") and incomparably grand; the great achievements have been extremely difficult to achieve (殊为不易, shu wei bu yi - "exceptionally, is, not, easy") and being a matter of worldwide attention (举世瞩目, ju shi zhu mu - "whole, world, raise, eye"), fully demonstrating the radiance of truth and practical power of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, demonstrating the brilliance and greatness of General Secretary Xi Jinping and the strong leadership of the Party Central Committee, and demonstrating the decisive significance of the Two Establishments (两个确立)." said Xu Qin, member of the Central Committee and Secretary of the Heilongjiang Provincial Party Committee.

"Since the beginning of the new era, General Secretary Xi Jinping has set the direction and turning the tide in a crisis (力挽狂澜, li wan kuang lan - "exert strength, save, turbulent waves"), advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party with unprecedented intensity, eliminating unhealthy tendencies or corrupt practices (歪风邪气, wai feng xie qi - "crooked, wind, evil, air") and deep-seated and difficult problems or social ills (顽瘴痼疾, wan zhang gu ji - "stubborn, miasma, chronic, disease") that had persisted for years. It can be said that without full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, there would be no sound political situation today." Yin Hong, member of the Central Committee and Secretary of the Jiangxi Provincial Party Committee, said that the continuous deepening of Party governance has continued to write the two miracles of rapid economic development and long-term social stability, demonstrating a new atmosphere of the governance of the Communist Party of China and the governance of China.

Wang Weizhong, member of the Central Committee and Secretary of the Party Committee of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, said: "Winning the battle against poverty and completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects; deeply practicing the concept that lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets, with ecological environmental protection undergoing historic, transformative, and holistic changes... Under the strong leadership of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, the cause of the Party and the state has achieved historic accomplishments and undergone historic changes, and the people have enjoyed an increasing sense of gain, happiness, and security."

"Since the beginning of the new era, the Party Central Committee and the Central Military Commission, with tremendous political courage and a strong sense of historical responsibility, have turned the blade inward, exercising full and rigorous self-governance of the Party and full and rigorous governance of the military. The people's armed forces have emerged renewed and strengthened after a crisis (浴火重生, yu huo zhong sheng - "bathe, fire, middle, rebirth") through rectification and forging, winning the historical initiative in strengthening the military and rejuvenating the armed forces. The 'Decision' reviewed and adopted by the Plenary Session, guided by Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, demonstrates the firm resolve and will to maintain the Party's advanced nature and purity and to carry self-revolution through to the end, and unites the hearts of the Party, the military, and the people." said Wang Gang, non-voting delegate and Commander of the Air Force.

The key to running China's affairs well lies in the Party, and the key lies in the Party governing the Party and exercising full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. Comrades participating in the session expressed that to walk well the Long March of the new era, it is necessary to adhere to the strict tone, strict measures, and strict atmosphere consistently to the end, and it is necessary to persistently advance full and rigorous self-governance of the Party.

"The 'Decision' reviewed and adopted by the Plenary Session runs through Xi Jinping's thought on Party building as its 'outline' and 'soul' throughout, and is a programmatic document for continuously advancing the new great project of Party building in the new era." Wu Hansheng, member of the Central Committee and Minister of the Central Social Work Department, said that the strategic deployment made by the Plenary Session is of major and far-reaching significance for better giving play to the political guidance and political guarantee role of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and for comprehensively advancing the building of a strong country and the great cause of national rejuvenation through Chinese modernization.

"The more effective Party governance is, the stronger the guarantee for economic and social development. The Plenary Session's special study of several major issues concerning persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party fully demonstrates General Secretary Xi Jinping's superb political wisdom, far-reaching strategic considerations, strong historical responsibility, and profound feelings for the people as the leader of a major party and major country." Ni Hong, member of the Central Committee, Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Minister of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, said that the convening of this session will surely provide a strong political guarantee for promoting high-quality development and advancing Chinese modernization.

"At the important juncture of the 105th anniversary of the founding of our Party and the opening year of the '15th Five-Year Plan,' the Plenary Session's systematic deployment on persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is very important and very necessary." Zhong Baijun, non-voting delegate and Secretary of the Party Committee of Xijidang Village, Zhebu Town, Ganyu District, Lianyungang City, Jiangsu Province, said, "Full and rigorous self-governance of the Party requires both investigating major cases and managing micro-power at the grassroots level. Now that villages are developing industries and launching projects, and managing collective 'three assets' (funds, assets, and resources), risks follow accordingly, which requires continuously advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party to extend to the grassroots level."

One part deployment, nine parts implementation. Deeply studying and implementing the spirit of the Plenary Session is a major political task for the entire Party in the current and upcoming period. Comrades participating in the session expressed that they will seriously study and implement Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, fully implement the important speeches of the General Secretary and the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee, earnestly shoulder the political responsibility of Party governance, continuously promote high-quality development, and promote the Party and the country's cause to move steadily to achieve long-term success (行稳致远, xing wen zhi yuan - "walk, steady, reach, far").

"The 'Decision' emphasizes 'highlighting efforts in Party building in emerging fields.' This deployment reflects distinct contemporaneity and practical relevance." Wu Hansheng said that the Central Social Work Department will highlight efforts in Party building in new economic organizations, new social organizations, and new employment groups, highlight Party building leading grassroots governance and grassroots political power building, highlight work on uniting and serving the masses, and use high-quality social work to help write a new chapter in strengthening the Party and the country.

"We will persistently advance full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, firmly establish and practice a correct view of political achievements, practice the people's city concept, issue more policies benefiting the people, do more practical work for people's livelihoods, promote urban renewal and improvement of rural living environments with high quality, and advance in an integrated manner the 'four good' construction of good housing, good neighborhoods, good communities, and good urban areas, so that the people's sense of gain is more solid and more sufficient." Ni Hong said.

"Jiangxi will adhere to using Xi Jinping's thought on Party building to plan and advance Party building, continuously strengthen the Party's political construction, strengthen the theoretical arming of the Party's innovative theories, closely integrate red culture education with education in loyalty to the Party and Party spirit tempering, strictly conduct political life within the Party, continuously enhance the Party spirit cultivation of Party members and cadres, and let the red gene of loyalty to the Party in the old revolutionary base areas be passed down from generation to generation." Yin Hong stated.

"We must resolutely implement the major decisions and deployments of the Party Central Committee, bear in mind the 'Three Imperatives,' deepen the construction of work style and capability, persistently rectify conduct, enforce discipline, and combat corruption, create a sound political ecosystem, accelerate the building of a diligent and incorruptible Heilongjiang, strive to achieve comprehensive revitalization and all-around revitalization, write a new chapter of Chinese modernization in Heilongjiang, and contribute to the great cause of building a strong country and national rejuvenation." Xu Qin said.

"Inner Mongolia will deeply study and implement the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee, persistently advance full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, demonstrate new achievements in building the 'two barriers,' 'two bases,' and 'one bridgehead,' and write a new chapter in promoting the building of the Chinese nation community and common prosperity in border ethnic regions." Wang Weizhong said.

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A Programmatic Document for Advancing the Great New Project of Party Building in the New Era

By: 本报记者 孙 振 杜尚泽 新华社记者 张晓松 朱基钗

"To run China's affairs well, the key lies in the Party, and the key lies in full and rigorous self-governance of the Party."

A Party that is committed to the eternal great cause of the Chinese nation and persists in seeking happiness for the Chinese people and rejuvenation for the Chinese nation has never ceased its solid steps toward strengthening its own construction.

From October 26 to 29, the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party was held in Beijing, focusing its research on the issue of persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party.

The Plenary Session heard and discussed the work report delivered by General Secretary Xi Jinping on behalf of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, and deliberated and adopted the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning Persistently Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party." The General Secretary explained the "Decision (Draft)" to the Plenary Session.

The explanation opens by elaborating on the considerations behind setting this theme, "This is a major decision made by the Party Central Committee based on acting according to the prevailing circumstances (审时度势, shen shi du shi - "examine the time, assess the situation"), overall consideration, grasping the historical position of the development of the Party and the country's cause, and focusing on the overall situation of Chinese modernization."

A "programmatic document for advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era" has been produced, and its weight for the new journey of Chinese modernization is extremely heavy or significant (千钧重, qian jun zhong - "thousand jin, heavy").

"The Party and the people have won the historical initiative to strengthen the Party and strengthen the country"

The 14th Five-Year Plan has been successfully concluded, and the 15th Five-Year Plan has gotten off to a good start. Since the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party, the report card on reform, development, and stability, and on internal affairs, diplomacy, and national defense, has been weighty.

General Secretary Xi Jinping delivered the work report on behalf of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, which contains both theoretical innovation and practical depth.

During the discussions, participating comrades combined their respective fields of work to share their insights and express confidence. From the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, to the great achievements in governing and managing the Party, rejuvenating and strengthening the Party in the new era; from carrying out study and education on establishing and practicing a correct view of political achievements, to grandly celebrating the 105th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China; from the socialist cause with Chinese characteristics in the new era creating a new situation, to the Two Establishments, a major political achievement of the new era, they connected the report with the draft Decision for discussion and reflection.

The Plenary Session unanimously agreed that great achievements have been made in full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, "fundamentally reversing the lax, weak, and loose state of Party governance and management, curbing some unhealthy tendencies that had long gone unchecked, rectifying some chronic and stubborn diseases that had persisted for many years, eliminating serious hidden dangers within the Party, the state, and the military, and making the Party stronger and more capable through revolutionary tempering."

"Full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era has opened up a new realm of self-revolution for the century-old major Party, promoted historic achievements and historic changes in the cause of the Party and the state, and the Party and the people have won the historical initiative to strengthen the Party and strengthen the country."

Where does the historical initiative come from?

The "Decision" adopted by the Plenary Session puts forward seven principles for persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party: adhere to serving the mission and tasks, adhere to taking the Party's political construction as the guide, adhere to comprehensive strictness, adhere to a problem-oriented approach, adhere to upholding fundamental principles and breaking new ground, adhere to leading by example from above, and adhere to governing the Party according to regulations. The "Decision" points out: "These principles are a scientific summary of the experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era and must be upheld for the long term and continuously enriched and developed."

General Secretary Xi Jinping profoundly pointed out that "serving and obeying the development of the cause of the Party and the state has always been an important principle of Party building" and that "the drafting of the 'Decision (Draft)' adhered to staying true to the Party's original aspiration and founding mission."

Born for the people, thriving because of the people. The thousand-jin promise made when the Red Boat set sail has been integrated into the century-long journey of governing and managing the Party, written into the lines of the "Decision," and has begun to lead another journey of steadfast progress.

The "Decision" "the first section is the first part, which is the general introduction," "elaborating on the importance, urgency, and overall requirements of persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party," reviewing the glorious course, summarizing great achievements, analyzing the situation and tasks, proposing guiding ideology, and clarifying the principles to be followed — concise, profound, and well-ordered.

Among them are the revelations of history, the sublimation of theory, and the distillation of practice.

On the new journey of the new era, General Secretary Xi Jinping has repeatedly pondered how to continue to answer Yan'an's "cave-dwelling question." And this time, in conjunction with the Party's century-long history, the "Decision" profoundly explains: finding the two answers of "letting the people supervise the government" and "self-revolution" to escape the historical cycle of rise and fall, chaos and order, is the unique creation of the Communist Party of China and will forever be recorded in the annals of Marxist party building.

During group discussions, participating comrades hotly debated why it is necessary to "persistently advance," unanimously agreeing that the General Secretary's major thesis on the "three inevitable requirements" in his explanation was like the sounding of great bells and drums:

"This is an inevitable requirement for maintaining the Party's advanced nature and purity and consolidating its long-term governing position";

"This is an inevitable requirement for consolidating and developing the highly united and unified situation of the whole Party and the highly cohesive political situation of the Party, the military, and the people";

"This is an inevitable requirement for fulfilling the Party's historical mission and promoting the steady and long-term development of the cause of the Party and the state."

Since the 18th National Congress of the Party, General Secretary Xi Jinping, with the immense political courage of "even if millions oppose me, I will go," and the strong sense of mission and responsibility of "offending thousands of people, yet not failing the 1.4 billion," has made full and rigorous self-governance of the Party a long-term strategy and eternal subject of the Party, without taking a single step back, and grasping it through to the end.

During the drafting process, the General Secretary personally served as head of the drafting group, deployed extensive solicitation of opinions from all sides, presided over three meetings of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee and two meetings of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee to deliberate and revise the draft "Decision."

During the four-day Plenary Session, multiple group discussions were arranged around the draft "Decision." Leading comrades of the Central Committee went deep into each group to listen to opinions and suggestions, and frequently exchanged views and discussed with everyone. Participating comrades spoke enthusiastically, and a resonance persisted and surged: "The great achievements in governing and managing the Party, rejuvenating and strengthening the Party in the new era, and the creation of a new situation in the socialist cause with Chinese characteristics are fundamentally due to the helm-holding and navigation of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, and due to the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era."

"Strengthening Party spirit is the fundamental task of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party"

"Party spirit is the cornerstone of Party members and cadres' establishment of their person, their career, their words, and their virtue."

The "Decision" makes a dedicated chapter arrangement for strengthening the Party spirit of Communists, and places it first among the seven strategic tasks and major measures for persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, reflecting a profound understanding and grasp of the laws of governing a Marxist ruling party, and further enriching and developing Xi Jinping's thought on Party building.

"Strengthening the Party spirit of Communists," "strictly implementing and enforcing democratic centralism," "forging a high-quality cadre contingent capable of shouldering the heavy task of national rejuvenation," "building a rigorous organizational system that is connected from top to bottom and effective in execution," "unceasingly rectifying work styles and enforcing discipline," "unswervingly advancing the integrated promotion of not daring to be corrupt, not being able to be corrupt, and not wanting to be corrupt," and "adhering to governing the Party by institutions and regulations" — these seven strategic tasks and major measures of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party erect the four beams and eight pillars of "persistent advancement," anchoring the goal of "effectively enhancing the overall efficiency of Party governance and management."

Today's full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is no longer a single-point effort, but rather adheres to taking the Party's political construction as the guide, emphasizes the coordinated efforts of all aspects of Party construction and the articulation and matching of various policies and measures, emphasizes leading by example from above, combining points and areas, and addressing both symptoms and root causes, and emphasizes forming a work pattern of top-down and bottom-up connection, integration of departments and localities, and joint management.

"Persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is a systematic project; it is necessary to plan and advance the Party's political construction, ideological construction, organizational construction, work style construction, discipline construction, institutional construction, and the fight against corruption as an organic whole, and strive to improve the system for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party," emphasized General Secretary Xi Jinping.

Striving to strengthen the Party spirit of Communists is an urgent practical issue.

General Secretary Xi Jinping once pointed out: "Problems with cadres now mainly arise from 'virtue,' from weak Party spirit." The "Decision" points out that "a small number of Party members and cadres, including senior cadres, have weak Party spirit, wavering or even missing ideals and convictions, indifferent feelings toward the masses, and deviations in their view of political achievements..."

"Making the strengthening of Party spirit cultivation a lifelong subject," the Plenary Session proposed that Party members and cadres must work hard in six aspects: firmly establishing ideals and convictions, casting unwavering loyalty to the Party, deeply cultivating feelings for the people, adhering to seeking truth from facts, purifying moral character, and maintaining integrity and honesty.

To temper Party spirit, for Party members and cadres, the foremost task is to persist in using Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era to solidify the soul and forge the spirit, achieving the integration of learning, thinking, and application, and the unity of knowledge, belief, and action. It is necessary to "temper Party spirit in practice," be capable of shouldering the heavy task of national rejuvenation, and be firm actors and doers in Chinese modernization.

"Tempering Party spirit in practice," from the local level to the central level, General Secretary Xi Jinping has taken the lead by example. "I will be selfless, and live up to the people" shows his breadth of mind; "tears turn the tung trees into rain" reflects his feelings; "work style construction is always on the way, and there is never a rest stop" demonstrates his determination... These words profoundly interpret: "Party spirit and affinity to the people have always been consistent and unified."

Participating comrades unanimously agreed that it is necessary to further strengthen faith in Marxism, conviction in communism, and confidence in socialism with Chinese characteristics, achieving "devout and persistent, deeply believing and profound."

Since the 18th National Congress of the Party, focusing on "building the Party well and building it strong," strengthening Party spirit cultivation has been made an important part of the great new project of Party building in the new era, continuously endowing Xi Jinping's thought on Party building with new contemporary significance.

The 20th National Congress of the Party incorporated "simultaneously grasping Party spirit, work style, and discipline" and "enhancing Party spirit awareness" into the strategic deployment of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party; this Plenary Session has put forward new measures, "nourishing Party spirit with the Party's fine traditions and China's excellent traditional culture."

Studying the first and second volumes of the "Selected Works of Xi Jinping on Party Building," and thoroughly studying the first and second volumes of the "Selected Works of Xi Jinping on Culture," one finds many widely cited allusions: the admonition cast by Zheng Kaofu, a senior official of the Song state during the Spring and Autumn period, on the tripod in his family temple; the story of Yang Zhen of the Eastern Han Dynasty "refusing gold with the knowledge of the four" ... Party history stories, new era integrity culture, and the "second combination" are vividly applied to full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. The new realm of governing and managing the Party, rejuvenating and strengthening the Party in the new era is rooted in the five-thousand-year unbroken Chinese civilization, and is fundamentally due to the guidance of the Party's innovative theory.

"Rectify and solve the prominent problems facing Party building well"

Problems are the voice of the times, and "highlighting a problem-oriented approach" is one of the key points emphasized in the drafting of the "Decision."

"Take solving prominent problems within the Party as the focus, do not avoid contradictions, do not conceal illnesses and avoid medical treatment, and improve work standards in correcting deviations, rectifying chaos, and eliminating the turbid and promoting the clear."

Full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era has achieved historic and pioneering achievements, and the basic realization of Chinese modernization has entered a critical period. The "Decision," as a programmatic document for advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era, has attracted worldwide attention.

One still remembers that after the 18th National Congress of the Party, the warnings of the "four major tests" and the "four dangers" are still ringing in our ears. Turning the blade inward, using severe punishment to rectify chaos! The Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core "directly faced the grim reality of the once-weakened, virtualized, and diluted leadership of the Party, the lax, weak, and ineffective governance and management of the Party, and the shocking problems within the Party."

At the Plenary Session, General Secretary Xi Jinping proposed that the tasks of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party face three "more arduous" challenges: the task of the Party uniting and leading the people to safeguard national sovereignty, security, and development interests is more arduous; the task of the Party uniting and leading the people to promote reform and development and maintain social harmony and stability is more arduous; and the task of the Party maintaining its advanced nature and purity is more arduous.

This is a new major judgment made in response to the profound changes in the world situation, national conditions, and Party conditions, and the many new situations and new problems the Party faces. This major judgment is made from the strategic height of consolidating the Party's long-term governing position and realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, providing fundamental guidance for persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. At the same time, the "four major tests" and "four dangers" facing the Party are long-term, complex, and severe.

Full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is always on the way.

Being sober and firm — this is precisely the attitude of Chinese Communists toward problems. Only by adhering to a problem-oriented approach can the whole Party recognize the importance and urgency of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, enhance strategic resolve, and strengthen confidence in victory.

Among the seven principles of the "Decision," one is "adhering to a problem-oriented approach." When explaining this, the General Secretary hit the nail on the head: "The several parts of the draft 'Decision' are not laid out flatly and comprehensively according to the overall layout of Party building, but rather are planned and arranged by grasping key essentials and focusing on prominent problems."

Aiming at the target, applying targeted measures. As General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized in his explanation, "When planning ideas and measures, adhere to solving whatever problems exist, and focusing on solving whichever problems are most prominent, identify the crux of the problems, conduct in-depth research and argumentation, and propose targeted countermeasures."

Some people once waited and watched, wondering whether full and rigorous self-governance of the Party would be a passing fad. Practice has proven that the intensity has not diminished, it is cautious to the end, and it is always on the way. The Plenary Session released a clear signal: "adhere to the strict tone" and "must be carried through consistently and strictly to the end."

This is a persistence written on the long scroll of time.

People clearly remember the commitment made by General Secretary Xi Jinping at the meeting between the Standing Committee of the 18th Political Bureau of the Central Committee and Chinese and foreign journalists: "Our responsibility is to work together with all comrades of the Party to adhere to the Party governing the Party and governing the Party strictly."

In December 2014, "full and rigorous self-governance of the Party" was first proposed and incorporated into the the Four-Pronged Comprehensive Strategy (四个全面) strategic layout. Since then, the Sixth Plenary Session of the 18th Central Committee of the Party has specially studied the issue of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party; the 19th National Congress of the Party established "adhering to full and rigorous self-governance of the Party" as one of the basic strategies for upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era; the Sixth Plenary Session of the 19th Central Committee of the Party listed "clarifying the strategic policy of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party" as an important part of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era; the 20th National Congress of the Party systematically deployed "unswervingly advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party and deepening the great new project of Party building in the new era."

Unswervingly advancing, a series of achievements in theoretical innovation, practical innovation, and institutional innovation have been made, and a system for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party has been constructed.

Grasping it through to the end with the force of a thunderbolt has established a good reputation and won people's hearts, and has also made foreign media marvel that the Communist Party of China's anti-corruption achievements are "a huge contribution comparable to solving the problem of food and clothing and greatly eliminating poverty in China, the world's most populous country."

This is a firm choice looking toward the future.

The second plenary meeting was held on the afternoon of the 29th, and General Secretary Xi Jinping once again emphasized "further enhancing the understanding of the importance and urgency of persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party." He narrated the problems, going deeper layer by layer, analyzing them in detail, clarifying understanding, and building consensus.

General Secretary Xi Jinping addressed some people's doubts: "Does full and rigorous self-governance of the Party hinder economic and social development, or does it safeguard and promote economic and social development?"

"Since the 18th National Congress of the Party, the cause of the Party and the state has achieved historic achievements and undergone historic changes, and full and rigorous self-governance of the Party has played a fundamental safeguarding role."

"If full and rigorous self-governance of the Party has any impact on economic and social development, then this impact is positive rather than negative. Because full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is about supporting the upright and eliminating the evil, clearing away silt and removing obstacles, correcting deviations and rectifying chaos, resolutely rectifying all unhealthy tendencies and corrupt practices, protecting a fair and competitive market environment, stimulating the positive energy of doing business and starting undertakings, and stopping harmful economic behaviors that mix in illegal interests and harm the fundamental interests of the people."

General Secretary Xi Jinping's voice echoed through the venue: "Facing the future, no matter what difficulties we encounter, no matter how great the trials of wind and waves we endure, we must maintain our resolve, strengthen our confidence, and consistently advance full and rigorous self-governance of the Party without the slightest hesitation or retreat."

"Determined to pursue truth, always keeping the direction of progress correct," originating from the departure of the Red Boat, opened up by the great expedition, running through the different historical periods of revolution, construction, and reform, and in the magnificent new era, accumulating strength and gaining momentum.

"The Plenary Session decided that the 21st National Congress of the Communist Party of China will be held in Beijing in the second half of 2027. The Plenary Session believes that the 21st National Congress of the Party is a very important congress to be held during the critical period of basically realizing socialist modernization and on the new journey toward the Second Centenary Goal, and is a major event in the political life of the Party and the state."

The new journey is the new Long March of the Party and the people. "Thoroughly studying and implementing the spirit of the Plenary Session is a major political task for the whole Party at present and for a period to come." Under the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping's thought on Party building, the whole Party has always maintained unified thinking, firm will, coordinated action, and strong combat effectiveness. By persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, it will surely continue to create a new situation in governing and managing the Party, rejuvenating and strengthening the Party in the new era, and strive to create new brilliance on the new Long March.

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“Further Strengthened the Stability and Cohesion of the Century-Old Party”（Foreign Media on China）

From October 26 to 29, the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China was held in Beijing. International media and research institutions believe that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee focused on studying the issue of persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, fully reflecting the Communist Party of China's high degree of clarity and firm will regarding strengthening its own construction. The Communist Party of China continuously advances full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, which helps advance the construction of Chinese modernization and also provides valuable experience that political parties around the world can draw upon.

Providing a strong political guarantee for promoting China's high-quality development and advancing Chinese modernization

Multiple foreign media outlets stated that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee focused on persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, which is of great significance for ensuring that the Communist Party of China always remains a vibrant Marxist governing party that stays at the forefront of the times, enjoys the heartfelt support of the people, and withstands various trials and tribulations.

An article on the website of Russia's Izvestia newspaper pointed out that the Communist Party of China attaches great importance to strengthening its own construction and is committed to continuously realizing the Party's self-purification, self-improvement, self-renewal, and self-enhancement. This will enable China to advance more steadily toward its established development goals.

Pakistan's Daily Pakistan newspaper reported that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee reviewed and adopted the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning Persistently Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party," highly praised the great achievements of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, and made systematic arrangements for persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. The report quoted experts as saying that this session has the key significance of serving as a link between the past and the future (承前启后, cheng qian qi hou - "bear, front; open, back"), and will provide a strong political guarantee for promoting China's high-quality development and advancing Chinese modernization.

An article on Pakistan's "China-Pakistan Economic Corridor Daily" website pointed out that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee provided an opportunity for the Communist Party of China to examine the challenges faced by Party building work and to study measures for persistently advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party. Through these efforts, the Communist Party of China aims to strengthen the governance of the Party through institutions and regulations, ensuring that the Party always remains the strong leading core of the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics.

A report on the website of Egypt's Al-Ahram newspaper said that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee was held, requiring that with higher standards and more concrete measures, the valuable experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era be upheld and applied well, that prominent problems facing Party building be rectified and resolved well, and that the sound political situation formed through Party management and governance be consolidated and developed well.

Egypt's Free News Network reported: "The Communist Party of China has further enhanced the stability and cohesion of this century-old major party. In the face of complex global changes and new circumstances, the Communist Party of China has further strengthened discipline construction, which helps safeguard the country's development achievements."

The Communist Party of China continuously realizes self-purification, self-improvement, self-renewal, and self-enhancement

The Daily Pakistan published a commentary stating that at the time of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee, China is comprehensively advancing the construction of Chinese modernization, and full and rigorous self-governance of the Party is the fundamental guarantee for the major achievements of the Party and the country's undertakings in the new era. Since the 18th CPC National Congress, the CPC has strengthened discipline construction, intra-Party supervision, and other measures through a series of initiatives, in order to strengthen ideals and convictions, uphold the Party's basic line, safeguard the authority of the Party Central Committee, and maintain close ties with the people.

Thailand's Bangkok Business News reported that the CPC aims to further improve national governance capacity, continuously advance anti-corruption work, while strengthening supervision and accountability for dereliction of duty and misconduct. The report also mentioned that China strives to combine improving the construction of the cadre team with promoting industrial development and scientific and technological progress.

Singapore's Lianhe Zaobao published a commentary pointing out that China's anti-corruption work not only emphasizes the serious investigation and punishment of disciplinary and legal violations, but also focuses on institutional construction and cadre supervision, reflecting China's efforts to continuously improve the national governance system and strengthen policy implementation.

A report on Saudi Arabia's Arab News website believed that the Communist Party of China has continuously strengthened supervision, discipline enforcement, and accountability in recent years, strengthened institutional construction, and deepened the fight against corruption, which helps enhance its ability to lead economic and social development and modernization.

A report on the website of the Brazil Real Media Group focused on the Communist Party of China's practice of maintaining the health of its body, breaking out of the historical cycle of rise and fall, and pointed out that the Communist Party of China continuously realizes self-purification, self-improvement, self-renewal, and self-enhancement, promptly discovering and correcting problems.

An article on the website of Chile's El Clarín newspaper stated that responding to the needs of the people, strengthening the ties between the Party and the people, advancing the fight against corruption, strictly enforcing political discipline, improving public services, and strengthening self-construction are important aspects of the Communist Party of China's efforts to enhance its governing capacity. The article also introduced discussions such as upholding that everyone is equal before laws and regulations, that there are no privileges in observing laws and regulations, and that there are no exceptions in enforcing laws and regulations, ensuring that institutional provisions truly become live high-voltage lines, and believed that these requirements clarify the code of conduct for CPC members.

The experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party provides reference for countries seeking to explore their own development paths

A special report by Singapore's Channel News Asia pointed out that the significance of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee lies not only in anti-corruption, but also involves organizational construction, cadre education and training, intra-Party supervision, institutional construction, accountability and responsibility investigation. The report believed that the plenary session has become an important window for observing China's future governance direction.

A report by Tajikistan's Khovar National News Agency said that under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, China unswervingly advances its development cause along the established path, which is an important reason for China's success. At present, the international situation is undergoing profound changes, and China maintains stable development; its relevant experience is worth learning from for developing countries.

An article on the website of Kenya's African Policy Institute believed that the plenary session reflected the Communist Party of China's persistent advancement of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, transforming the vision of Chinese modernization into tangible results that improve people's well-being and promote global development. The article emphasized that all parties in Africa should seize the opportunity to conduct dialogue and cooperation with the Communist Party of China in areas of common concern, including governing and administering the country (治国理政, zhi guo li zheng - "govern, country; manage, administration"), economic development, poverty reduction, and technological progress, jointly addressing global challenges.

An article on Rwanda's "Africa-China Review" website stated that effective governance is key to achieving national development goals. The Communist Party of China strengthens discipline construction, rectifies unhealthy tendencies or corrupt practices (不正之风, bu zheng zhi feng - "not, correct; that, wind"), and improves supervision mechanisms, in order to enhance the Party's governing capacity and maintain public trust. The article said that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee has attracted global attention. As a major global trading power, manufacturing power, and technological power, China's governance practices and economic policies not only affect its own development, but also have an important impact on the global economy.

An article on the website of Argentina's Contemporary magazine stated that strengthening the Party's discipline construction aims to improve the Communist Party of China's ability to respond to risks, advance reforms, and achieve economic and social development goals. The article focused on China's practices in formulating strategic plans, maintaining policy stability, and the selection, training, and assessment of cadres, believing that "to govern the country, one must first govern the Party; to govern the Party, one must be strict" is an important aspect of understanding China's experience in governing and administering the country, and that the relevant experience provides reference for countries seeking to explore their own development paths.

An article on the website of Pakistan's Diplomatic Insight magazine believed that the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee has important international significance. The enhancement of governance efficiency helps create stable investment and cooperation relationships, improve the quality of project implementation, and strengthen the confidence of trading partners. This is crucial for the stability of global industrial and supply chains and the smooth advancement of various development projects. Therefore, China's institutional construction is conducive to stable cooperation among partners from various countries in an uncertain global environment.

(People's Daily, Beijing, Moscow, Islamabad, Jakarta, Bangkok, Cairo, Dubai, Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro, Astana, Johannesburg, Nairobi, October 30   Reporters Li Yan, Xiao Xinxin, Zhao Yipu, Cao Shiyun, Zhang Jinruo, Shen Xiaoxiao, Jiao Xiang, Wang Xuchen, Wang Xiaobo, Chen Haiqi, Li Qiang, Zou Song, Huang Weixin)

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Opening a New Chapter of Common Development and Prosperity for China and Oman (Ambassador's Notes)

By: 吕 健

At the invitation of President Xi Jinping, Sultan Haitham of Oman will pay a state visit to China from November 1 to 2. This is the first visit to China by an Omani sultan since the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Oman 48 years ago. The heads of state of the two countries will make top-level design for China-Oman relations and draw a blueprint for future development, marking a milestone.

Oman is an important country in the Middle East and the Gulf region and one of the oldest civilizations on the Arabian Peninsula. Although China and Oman are far apart, the peoples of the two countries have come to know each other through the millennia-old Maritime Silk Road, sowing the seeds of friendship. As early as the 8th century AD, the Omani navigator Abu Ubaidah set out from Sohar, sailing a wooden sailing ship across the Indian Ocean for more than seven months to reach Guangzhou, China, becoming the first Arab recorded in Chinese historical records to arrive in China by sea. More than 600 years ago, the Chinese navigator Zheng He led his fleet, sailing with full speed and high spirits (云帆高张, yun fan gao zhang - "cloud, sail, high, stretch"), and visited Oman's Dhofar four times, bringing Chinese porcelain, silk, and tea, and trading for Omani frankincense and other specialty spices. The long and continuous history (源远流长, yuan yuan liu chang - "source, far, flow, long") of traditional friendship between China and Oman is a precious treasure cherished by both sides, fully embodying the Silk Road spirit of peaceful cooperation, openness and inclusiveness, learning from and referencing each other (互学互鉴, hu xue hu jian - "each other, learn, each other, examine"), and achieving mutual benefits and win-win results (互利共赢, hu li gong ying - "each other, benefit, together, win").

Since the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1978, China-Oman political mutual trust has continued to deepen, and friendly cooperation in various fields has advanced steadily. In the new era, the heads of state of the two countries attach great importance to the development of bilateral relations. President Xi Jinping and the Sultan of Oman have exchanged letters on multiple occasions, charting the course for the development of bilateral relations. China and Oman have always respected each other, treated each other as equals, cooperated in friendship, and achieved mutual benefits and win-win results. Oman adheres to the one-China principle, firmly supports China's core interests and major concerns, and supports the major concepts and propositions put forward by President Xi Jinping, including building a community with a shared future for mankind, high-quality Belt and Road cooperation, and the four global initiatives. China firmly supports Oman in safeguarding its national sovereignty, security, and development interests, supports Oman in independently choosing a development path suited to its national conditions, appreciates Oman's adherence to resolving disputes through dialogue and consultation, and supports Oman in playing a mediating role on regional hotspot issues.

Under the strategic guidance of the heads of state of the two countries, the China-Oman strategic partnership has made steady and sustained progress, demonstrating strong momentum and potential. In 2018, China and Oman established a strategic partnership and signed a memorandum of understanding on Belt and Road cooperation. The two countries have deepened the strategic alignment of high-quality Belt and Road cooperation with Oman's "Vision 2040," leveraged their complementary economic advantages, and created new highlights of cooperation in new energy, advanced manufacturing, digital economy, aerospace, and artificial intelligence, infusing bilateral relations with new vitality. China's photovoltaic and wind power and other new energy industries have supported Oman's green development. The Oman Investment Authority has joined the China-Gulf Cooperation Council Joint Investment Federation. China and Oman have cooperated to launch Oman's first artificial satellite. Oman has become one of the founding member states of the World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organization. China has been Oman's largest trading partner since 2018, and Oman is China's fourth-largest trading partner among Arab countries.

People-to-people and cultural cooperation between the two countries is flourishing and showing no sign of decline (方兴未艾, fang xing wei ai - "just, rise, not, end"). In 2025, Oman incorporated Chinese into its national education system, with 8 high schools and 2 universities offering Chinese language courses, and hundreds of students enthusiastically enrolling. The two countries have opened direct flights, making people-to-people exchanges more convenient. In the first half of 2026, Chinese tourists visiting Oman reached 48,000 person-times, a year-on-year increase of over 40 percent. The two sides have seen increasingly close exchanges in talent cultivation and in the fields of culture, sports, and youth. Today, the Zheng He Memorial and the "Sohar" Memorial stand respectively in Salalah, Oman, and Guangzhou, China, serving as prominent landmarks of bilateral friendship.

The world today is characterized by a mixture of changes and turmoil (变乱交织, bian luan jiao zhi - "change, chaos, interweave"), and the desire of all countries for peace and development is growing stronger. China is comprehensively advancing the great cause of building a strong country and national rejuvenation through Chinese modernization, and advocates building a community with a shared future for mankind. Great truths are never lonely as friends come to follow them (大道不孤，有朋来仪, da dao bu gu, you peng lai yi - "great, way, not, lonely, have, friend, come, ceremony"). It is believed that under the strategic guidance of the heads of state of the two countries and with the joint efforts of the two peoples, the millennium-old friendship between China and Oman will surely write a new chapter of friendship, and the China-Oman strategic partnership will surely unleash strong momentum, opening a new chapter of common development and common prosperity for China and Oman.

(The author is the Chinese Ambassador to Oman)

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Xi Jinping Meets with Swiss Federal President Viola Amherd

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporter Gong Han) On the afternoon of October 30, President Xi Jinping met at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing with Swiss Federal President Viola Amherd, who was in China for a working visit.

Xi Jinping noted that Switzerland is an important partner of China in Europe, and its cooperation with China has always been at the forefront among European countries. At a time when surging countercurrents (逆流涌动, ni liu yong dong - "reverse, current, surge, move") of unilateralism and protectionism are prevalent, free trade cooperation has become the most distinctive hallmark of China-Switzerland relations, fully demonstrating the political courage and sense of responsibility of both countries in upholding openness and cooperation, and highlighting their unique leading role in promoting the building of an open world economy. Economies of all countries advance together when they are interconnected, and retreat separately when they are closed off. China is willing to work with Switzerland to hold high the banner of openness, strengthen the bonds of cooperation, promote universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalization, and jointly inject valuable confidence and greater certainty into China-Europe economic and trade cooperation and global economic development.

Xi Jinping stressed that since the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Switzerland, the two sides have adhered to achieving success together through mutual support (相互成就, xiang hu cheng jiu - "mutually, achieve, accomplish") and daring to be a pioneer (敢为人先, gan wei ren xian - "dare, be, person, first"), continuously interpreting the China-Switzerland spirit of cooperation featuring "equality, innovation, and win-win" with concrete results, and becoming a model for interactions between countries of different sizes and different social systems. The two sides should respect each other, treat each other as equals, and strengthen exchanges and policy coordination at all levels and across the board. China is accelerating the development of new quality productive forces and steadily expanding institutional opening up, and is willing to turn the Chinese market into a market for the world and a market shared by all. The two sides should adhere to mutual benefit and win-win outcomes, turning the blueprint of openness and cooperation into a visible and tangible reality. They should strengthen innovation cooperation, focus on fostering cooperation in emerging industries such as the digital economy, green energy storage, and artificial intelligence, build high-quality industrial and supply chains featuring collaborative innovation and shared benefits, and jointly promote the positive and ethical development of artificial intelligence for the benefit of mankind.

Xi Jinping pointed out that Switzerland has long played an important exemplary role in China-Europe economic and trade exchanges, and he hopes that the Swiss side will leverage its unique influence to play a positive role in promoting balanced and steady development of China-Europe trade. China and Switzerland share similar positions and concepts in supporting multilateralism. The two sides should deepen multilateral coordination and mutual support, firmly uphold the international system with the United Nations at its core and the international order based on international law, reform and improve the global governance system, and promote the building of a community with a shared future for mankind.

Amherd stated that as one of the first Western countries to recognize the People's Republic of China, Switzerland has always been deeply proud of this, which opened a lasting and dynamic partnership between the two countries. Since the establishment of diplomatic relations, the two sides have always respected each other, maintained close high-level exchanges, and achieved fruitful cooperation results in many fields such as trade and investment, scientific research and innovation, and labor and employment. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the establishment of the China-Switzerland Innovative Strategic Partnership. The two sides completed the upgrade negotiations of the free trade agreement with high quality in a short period of time, reflecting the high level of mutual trust between the two sides, meeting the expectations of enterprises and all parties in both countries, and will inject new impetus into the development of China-Switzerland relations. The Swiss side firmly adheres to the One-China policy, looks forward to strengthening dialogue and exchanges with China, adhering to mutually beneficial cooperation, and promoting greater development of cooperation in various fields. Switzerland attaches great importance to the positive role China plays in international affairs, and is willing to maintain close coordination with China, uphold multilateralism, safeguard free trade, and contribute to world development, prosperity, peace, and stability.

After the meeting, the two heads of state jointly witnessed the signing of the protocol on upgrading the China-Switzerland Free Trade Agreement and a number of cooperation documents in fields such as scientific research, labor and employment, and media.

Wang Yi attended the above activities.

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Photo Report

On October 30, the China-Europe freight train X8469, fully loaded with auto parts, plush toys, and household goods, slowly departed from Xi'an International Port Station in Shaanxi, heading for Duisburg, Germany, marking that the cumulative number of China-Europe freight trains (Xi'an) dispatched in 2026 has exceeded 5,000.

Photo by Cao Xin (China Images)

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Sultan Haitham of Oman to Pay State Visit to China

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) The Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson announced on the 30th: At the invitation of President Xi Jinping, Sultan Haitham of Oman will pay a state visit to China from November 1 to 2.

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Austrian Chancellor Stocker to Visit China

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporter Li Xinyi) A Foreign Ministry spokesperson announced on the 30th: At the invitation of Premier Li Qiang of the State Council, Austrian Chancellor Stocker will pay an official visit to China from November 2 to 7.

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Launch Event Held in Beijing for New Book *Selected Speeches of Shavkat Mirziyoyev: Uzbekistan on the Path to Sustainable Development and Prosperity*

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporters Ji Peijuan, Qu Song) On October 30, a launch event for the new book Selected Speeches of Shavkat Mirziyoyev: Uzbekistan on the Path to Sustainable Development and Prosperity was held in Beijing. The book was recently published by the People's Publishing House, compiling 55 speeches and addresses delivered by Shavkat Mirziyoyev, President of the Republic of Uzbekistan, at important conferences and events from 2021 to 2025, as well as a small number of interview transcripts and signed articles.

This work centrally reflects Uzbekistan's effective measures and latest achievements in reform and development, safeguarding regional security and stability, and deepening international cooperation. It centrally conveys Uzbekistan's firm determination and confidence in following a development path suited to its own national conditions, and centrally embodies President Mirziyoyev's in-depth thinking and vigorous practice in governing the country. The publication of this book is a vivid practice of deepening exchanges of governance experience between China and Uzbekistan. It holds special significance for implementing the important consensus of the two heads of state and promoting the development of China-Uzbekistan relations. It will provide important reference for experts, scholars, people from all sectors of society, and the broader readership who follow and study Uzbekistan's development, and further promote people-to-people and cultural exchanges between China and Uzbekistan and deepen China-Uzbekistan friendship.

At the launch event, the new book was unveiled. Representatives of relevant international organizations and representatives from relevant think tank institutions in China and Uzbekistan shared their reflections and impressions after reading the book, expressing the common aspiration to strengthen people-to-people and cultural exchanges between China and Uzbekistan, deepen mutual learning between civilizations (文明互鉴, wenming hujian - "civilization, mutually, learn from each other"), and develop everlasting friendship between generations. Responsible persons from relevant departments of China and Uzbekistan, diplomatic envoys and diplomats of some countries accredited to China, as well as relevant experts and scholars, attended the launch event.

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Zhang Qingwei Meets with Norbert Lammert, Vice President of the German Bundestag

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) On October 30, Zhang Qingwei, Vice Chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, met in Beijing with Norbert Lammert, Vice President of the German Bundestag, who accompanied German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier on his visit to China. The two sides exchanged in-depth views on issues of common concern, including promoting the development of China-Germany relations and strengthening exchanges between the legislative bodies of the two countries.

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China and South Africa Central Banks Renew Bilateral Local Currency Swap Agreement

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) (Reporters Ren Jun, Wu Yu) A reporter learned from the People's Bank of China on October 30 that recently the People's Bank of China and the South African Reserve Bank renewed their bilateral local currency swap agreement, with a swap scale of 30 billion yuan / 74 billion South African rand, and the agreement is valid for five years.

The People's Bank of China stated that the two sides' renewal of the bilateral local currency swap agreement will help further deepen monetary and financial cooperation between the two countries, promote the facilitation of bilateral trade and investment, and safeguard financial market stability.

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Zhou Qiang Meets German Körber Foundation Delegation

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) Zhou Qiang, Vice Chairperson of the CPPCC National Committee, met in Beijing on October 30 with a delegation from the German Körber Foundation. He briefed them on the guiding principles of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, the system of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and the strategy of comprehensive law-based governance. The two sides exchanged views on upholding the positioning of the China-EU comprehensive strategic partnership, engaging in dialogue and consultation (对话协商, duihua xieshang - "dialogue, consult, negotiate") to properly handle differences, and working together to address challenges (携手应对, xie shou ying dui - "hand in hand, respond to") on global issues.

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Fully Implement Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building

By: 本报评论员

The great cause has opened a new chapter, and the great project must create a new situation.

The Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party, from the strategic height of the overall development of the Party and the country's undertakings, comprehensively summarized the great achievements and valuable experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, deeply analyzed the new situation, new tasks, and new challenges facing Party building, and deliberated and adopted the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning Persistently Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party." This is a programmatic document for continuously advancing the new great project of Party building in the new era, reflecting the historical initiative of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core to strengthen the Party and the country, and it will surely powerfully mobilize and inspire the whole Party to strengthen confidence, maintain resolve, and continuously create a new situation in governing and managing the Party, and revitalizing and strengthening the Party in the new era.

In the new era, the determination for full and rigorous self-governance of the Party has been unprecedented (前所未有, qian suo wei you - "before, has, not, have"), and the intensity has been unprecedented (unprecedented, qian suo wei you - "before, has, not, have"). The Party has found the second answer to escaping the historical cycle of rise and fall, order and chaos, opened a new realm of self-revolution for a century-old major party, and through revolutionary tempering has become stronger and more capable. Party conduct, government conduct, and social atmosphere have taken on a completely new appearance (焕然一新, huan ran yi xin - "glow, change, one, new"), forming a new atmosphere of the governance of the Communist Party of China and the governance of China.

The achievement of these results is fundamentally due to the leading and steering the direction (领航掌舵, ling hang zhang duo - "lead, sail, hold, helm") of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, and to the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era. This fully demonstrates that the Two Establishments (两个确立) are the greatest certainty, the greatest confidence, and the greatest guarantee for us in overcoming all difficulties and obstacles (战胜一切艰难险阻, zhan sheng yi qie jian nan xian zu - "win, overcome, all, difficult, dangerous, obstacles") and responding to all uncertainties.

Over the past 105 years, the key reason the Party has always grasped historical initiative and continuously created miracles lies in its excellent qualities such as vowing to pursue (矢志追求, shi zhi zhui qiu - "aim, will, pursue, seek") truth, and in its possession of the scientific theoretical guidance of Marxism.

As the chapter on Party building of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building profoundly answers the major issue of the times of "what kind of long-term governing Marxist party to build and how to build a long-term governing Marxist party," enriching and developing the Marxist theory of Party building. It is a major achievement of adhering to the Two Integrations (两个结合) in advancing the Party's theoretical innovation, a crystallization of the practical experience and collective wisdom of the Party and the people, and has major practical significance and long-term guiding significance for strengthening the Party and the country.

Thought is like a torch, illuminating the new road of the examination and leading a more magnificent journey.

The most distinctive feature of the "Decision" is the comprehensive implementation of Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building, running it through as a main thread of thought, and fully implementing it in the framework arrangement of the document, in summarizing achievements and experience, in analyzing the situation and tasks, in clarifying the guiding ideology and the major principles of the "Seven Upholds," and in proposing policy measures. This is a full application of the valuable experience of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party in the new era, reflecting the deepening of our Party's understanding of the laws of governing a Marxist ruling party, and will surely powerfully promote the governance and management of the Party and the revitalization and strengthening of the Party to innovate while upholding fundamentals and to develop while inheriting.

Here, explanations are provided around "strengthening the Party spirit of Communists" and "strictly implementing and carrying out democratic centralism," in order to deepen understanding and grasp of the spirit of the Plenary Session.

Strengthening Party spirit is the fundamental task of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and tempering Party spirit is a lifelong topic for Party members and cadres. "Persisting in tempering a strong Party spirit" is an important part of Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building.

From unswervingly using the Party's new theoretical innovations in the new era to consolidate the soul and forge the heart, and tempering the political character of loyalty to the Party, to incorporating "persisting in grasping Party spirit, Party conduct, and Party discipline together" and "enhancing Party spirit awareness" into the strategic deployment of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, and nurturing fine conduct with a strong Party spirit, to solidly carrying out study and education on establishing and practicing a correct view of political achievements, and persisting in finding gaps, tracing roots, and strengthening cultivation from the perspective of Party spirit...

It is precisely because of clearing up the source and correcting the origin (正本清源, zheng ben qing yuan - "correct, root, clear, source") and strengthening the foundation and vital energy (固本培元, gu ben pei yuan - "solidify, root, cultivate, origin") ideologically, building a solid foundation of faith, replenishing the calcium of spirit, and steadying the rudder of thought, that our Party has always been at the forefront of the times amid ever-changing and unpredictable situations (风云变幻, feng yun bian huan - "wind, cloud, change, transform"), and has always been the mainstay of the people of the whole country amid fierce winds and high waves (风高浪急, feng gao lang ji - "wind, high, wave, urgent").

Among the strategic tasks and major measures deployed by the Plenary Session to persistently advance full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, the first is "strengthening the Party spirit of Communists." The purpose is precisely to promote all Party members and cadres to uphold the Party's nature and purpose, enhance Party consciousness, Party member consciousness, and vanguard consciousness, always maintain the political character of Communists, deeply understand the decisive significance of the Two Establishments, and resolutely achieve the Two Upholds (两个维护).

Our Party is the world's largest governing party, established under the guidance of the Marxist theory of Party building and in accordance with the principle of democratic centralism. Democratic centralism is the Party's fundamental organizational principle and leadership system, and implementing and carrying out democratic centralism is an inherent requirement of full and rigorous self-governance of the Party.

How can the political advantages, organizational advantages, institutional advantages, and work advantages of democratic centralism be better brought into play? The foremost is to uphold and strengthen the centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee.

In formulating and implementing the five-year plan, the Party Central Committee sets the direction, plans the overall situation, and makes decisions, insisting on promoting democracy and pooling wisdom to increase benefits (集思广益, ji si guang yi - "collect, thought, expand, benefit"), and "once decided, grasping implementation";

In promoting the development of the Yangtze Economic Belt, all regions and departments unswervingly implement the decisions and deployments of the Party Central Committee, jointly focusing on major protection and refraining from major development, and "unswervingly following the path of prioritizing ecological conservation and green development."

The Party's leadership is the most essential feature of socialism with Chinese characteristics and the greatest advantage of the socialist system with Chinese characteristics. "Upholding the Party's leadership, first of all, means upholding the authority of the Party Central Committee and its centralized, unified leadership; this is the highest principle of the Party's leadership."

The Plenary Session made deployments around strictly implementing and carrying out democratic centralism. We must uphold and strengthen the centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee, fully promote intra-Party democracy, effectively implement correct centralism, raise the level of scientific, democratic, and law-based decision-making, and ensure that the Party always has strong creativity, cohesion, and combat effectiveness.

Having weathered storms without changing its original aspiration, with firm goals and courageous progress, the Party, uniting and leading hundreds of millions of people, is advancing toward great rejuvenation with unstoppable steps. Deeply studying and implementing the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party is a major political task for the whole Party at present and for a period to come. By conscientiously studying and implementing the spirit of the Plenary Session and adhering to the guidance of Xi Jinping's Thought on Party Building, our Party will surely always remain steadfast in its steps and full of vigor, leading the great cause of Chinese modernization to continuously move forward.

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President Xi Jinping's Special Envoy Gao Zhidan to Attend Opening Ceremony of 4th Youth Olympic Games in Dakar

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporter Li Xinyi) The Foreign Ministry spokesperson announced on the 30th: At the invitation of the government of the Republic of Senegal, President Xi Jinping's special envoy, Gao Zhidan, Director of the General Administration of Sport of China, will travel to Dakar, the capital of Senegal, to attend the opening ceremony of the 4th Youth Olympic Games to be held on October 31.

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Liu Haixing Meets with Guests from Uzbekistan and Germany Separately

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) On October 30, Liu Haixing, Minister of the International Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, met separately in Beijing with Davlatov, Advisor to the President of Uzbekistan, and Paulsen, President of the Körber Foundation of Germany, exchanging views on implementing the consensus of leaders, strengthening exchanges and cooperation, and promoting the development of bilateral relations.

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“Rooted in the Deep Mountains Like a Pine” (Most Exemplary Revolutionary Soldier of the New Era)

By: 本报记者 李龙伊

In the snowy forests of the Linhai region, there stands an unnamed mountain. Inside the machine room halfway up the mountain, Senior Sergeant Gao Debao crouches as he measures data, records parameters, listens to whether the current sounds normal, and checks whether the vibration of water flow in the cooling pipes is steady... He has held fast to this work for 18 years.

Gao Debao was once an airborne soldier in the former unit of Huang Jiguang, a special-class hero, and stood out within two years of enlistment, earning the title of "Outstanding Parachutist." Eighteen years ago, when his unit underwent restructuring and reform, he came to this unnamed mountain and devoted himself to equipment support work.

His comrades often say: "An iron camp sees a stream of soldiers pass through, but iron Old Gao's heart takes root." Rooted deep in the mountains, Gao Debao threw himself wholeheartedly into the equipment support post, innovatively developing a pulse signal generator that effectively extended the service life of components, and successively completed major exercise and training missions on multiple occasions, becoming a recognized "aerospace vanguard."

"When a tree takes root, it holds the deep mountains fast; when a person takes root, the camp stays evergreen"

His post shifted from the blue sky to the deep mountains, and a different trade is as different as a mountain apart.

When he first arrived at the unnamed mountain, pages of theory texts that read like "heavenly script" and equipment several stories tall left him at a loss. Gao Debao, with only a high school education, became the "layman" with the thinnest foundation in the unit.

One night while he was on duty in the machine room, the equipment suddenly malfunctioned and the mission could not be carried out. Red lights flashed and alarms blared. But not a single person in the entire duty group panicked. They investigated, located the fault, replaced the plug-in module, and before long the mission was successfully executed.

Gao Debao, watching from the side, was left staring speechlessly in amazement (目瞪口呆, mu deng kou dai - "eye, stare; mouth,呆"). The shift leader asked with a smile: "Little Gao, how about that? Our technical soldiers aren't worse than your airborne soldiers, are they?"

The airborne troops have a slogan: swell three times, subside three times, and you'll reach the clouds by dawn. Only after the legs have gone through swelling to subsiding, subsiding to swelling, and swelling to subsiding again are you qualified to receive the boarding pass for the aircraft. Gao Debao understood and said: "Whether airborne soldier or technical soldier, if you want to become an elite, there is only hard training."

From then on, he became the "shadow" of Expert Ke, a specialist from the factory and institute. Whether in the machine room, the rest area, or the cafeteria, the moment Ke showed his face, Gao would stick to him, pull out a stack of circuit diagrams, and press him with questions, sometimes for as little as 10 minutes, sometimes for as long as an hour. Ke teased him: "The two of us are like a cat chasing a mouse—I can't dodge you even if I want to."

In the high-voltage areas of the equipment, the radiation the human body absorbs during debugging is equivalent to being scanned once by an X-ray. He insisted on going in anyway: "That thrilling jump out of the sky didn't defeat me—can these operations really be harder than standing on the brink of life and death (生死一线, sheng si yi xian - "life, death, one, line")?"

In the machine room with no heating facilities, he recorded parameters, and when his hands froze stiff he tucked them into his chest to warm them, and when his feet froze through he hopped in place. With more than 2,000 hands-on operations a year, he drilled power supply debugging into muscle memory. Ke was convinced: "When Little Gao makes a move, it's the most precise calibration mark."

In just one year, Gao Debao worked through 6 theoretical books, 4 subsystem plans, and more than 100 maintenance procedures, becoming the first and only non-commissioned officer in the unit to qualify for the overall equipment post. In three years, he compiled more than 100,000 characters of equipment insights.

In the early days of the station's establishment, the unnamed mountain was a rocky mountain. Gao Debao often gazed blankly at the vast white snowfield outside the window, thinking: if only there were a touch of green. So he and his comrades picked up stones, dug tree pits, and planted trees. Gao Debao once said, "When a tree takes root, it holds the deep mountains fast; when a person takes root, the camp stays evergreen."

"As a Party member and backbone, I must step up when a task comes"

Gao Debao is 1.85 meters tall and does things with brisk vigor. But whenever it comes to equipment, he shows the patience of "fine embroidery." He often says: "There's no need to fear anything—when the sky falls, the tall ones hold it up."

He has honored this with his actions time and again.

On the eve of a certain mission, a sudden danger broke out in the machine room: a high-voltage power supply failed, sparks flew above the oil tank, and the smell of burning filled the air. "Locate the fault immediately!" came the order from the command group.

Gao Debao grabbed his tools and headed for the equipment room: "It's dangerous in there, but I know the equipment's condition best—let me go in!"

After the fault was cleared, just as he was withdrawing, a loud bang suddenly came from the room. Five minutes later he walked out, hands covering his ears, unable to hear his comrades' shouts. The hospital diagnosed auditory nerve damage, and his right ear has carried the old injury ever since.

On another occasion, on a stormy night, the core system of the equipment collapsed. Problems in other systems were like a "cold or fever," but a problem here was a "heart attack." The experts recommended replacing the component, yet if the debugging were off by even a little, it would cause irreversible damage.

On one side was an imminent and urgent (迫在眉睫, po zai mei jie - "approach, at, eyebrow, eyelashes") task, and on the other was a huge risk of hidden danger. "I can give it a try. I've been with this equipment since its debugging began—I know its 'temperament' best." Gao Debao stepped forward again and took on the task.

Only 5 hours remained before the mission began. He squeezed into the sealed space, listening, feeling, and looking. "Cooling is normal!" "Start modulation—listen for the 'hissing' sound!" "Power output is stable, tube current is normal!" The system was restored and the mission executed normally.

In the depths of winter, the temperature suddenly dropped to minus 30 degrees Celsius. Gao Debao, on a business trip elsewhere, received a call: "Sergeant, the equipment drive has failed." He rushed back across more than 1,000 kilometers and headed straight for the site through wind and snow.

To replace the motor, they had to remove old parts weighing several hundred jin, and someone had to climb up a tower base dozens of meters high to lower the new motor precisely onto the base with ropes. After fastening his safety harness, Gao Debao said: "I'll go up first to check the situation."

In the biting wind, the group dismantled, hoisted, powered up, and tested, and frost formed on everyone's eyebrows. At the moment the fault was resolved, someone started it—no one knew who—and everyone sang the station song: "Rooted in the bitter cold land of the eastern extremity, laughing at the three-foot waters of the Songhua River, enduring hardship without complaint, we are a band of soldiers on an unnamed mountain..." Gao Debao said: "As a Party member and backbone, I must step up when a task comes."

"The two things I care about most right now are, first, doing scientific research, and second, building the team"

Gao Debao has a habit: he crouches in front of the equipment, listens to the sound of the frequency modulation, watches the faint spark of the waveguide arcing, smells the odor the components give off, and feels the tremor of the cooling water flow. He calls this "look, listen, ask, and feel"—some tricks of the trade cannot be measured by instruments.

During a major mission, in order to map out the voltage fluctuation pattern of a component at low temperatures, Gao Debao led his team members crouching into the space beneath the equipment to collect data. If anyone missed a digit after the decimal point, he would anxiously slap his thigh and say: "That's not right!" Then he would help fill it in and check it repeatedly.

In the northeastern winter, the weather was bitterly cold (天寒地冻, tian han di dong - "sky, cold; earth, freeze"). Once Gao Debao caught a cold that lingered and would not heal. His comrades urged him to rest for a few days. He waved his hand and said: "If we don't finish collecting the data for one day, the research has to stop for one day."

Hard work pays off in the end (功夫不负有心人, gong fu bu fu you xin ren - "effort, not, fail, have, heart, person"). In the end, the team successfully designed a pulse signal generation device that extended the average service life of a key component by more than 2,000 hours, saving more than 2 million yuan in annual operation and maintenance costs. Their experience was compiled into a maintenance manual and translated into 8 national patents.

"The two things I care about most right now are, first, doing scientific research, and second, building the team." Speaking of future tasks, Gao Debao said.

Gao Debao assigns tasks according to professional expertise, and when he spots promising talent, he selects them for the research room to be mentored by veteran backbones.

In recent years, Gao Debao has led his team in eliminating more than 100 equipment faults and completing more than 10 invention achievements, two of which won awards in the whole-army equipment management and application innovation competition. Several team members have advanced to technician posts, and some have become operational backbones.

Last year, the unit set aside a research room exclusively for the innovation and tackling group. Gao Debao was overjoyed and said: "Now I can roll up my sleeves and do research!"

Honors have also come one after another: the Whole-Army Outstanding NCO Talent Award, the China Aerospace Foundation Award, "Aerospace Vanguard"... His military uniform is covered with medals.

Rooted deep in the mountains under harsh conditions, someone once asked Gao Debao why he did not consider changing to a different post. Gao Debao said: "The military has given me too many honors. All I can do is do my own job well, taking root in the deep mountains like a green pine."

On the unnamed mountain, pine trees stand one by one, their roots sunk deep into the earth. Through the long winter, "heavy snow presses the green pine, yet the green pine stands tall and straight," just like Gao Debao and his comrades—firm and indomitable (坚韧不拔, jian ren bu ba - "firm, resilient, not, pull"), rooted at their posts, contributing all their zeal to combat effectiveness building.

(Liu Hanzhe and Wang Xinge contributed to the reporting)

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9th Session of the 18th ACFTU Presidium (Enlarged) Meeting Held in Beijing

(Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, October 30) On October 30, the 9th Session of the 18th Presidium (Enlarged) Meeting of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) was held in Beijing. Wang Dongming, Vice Chairman of the NPC Standing Committee and Chairman of the ACFTU, presided over the meeting and delivered a speech.

Wang Dongming pointed out that the ACFTU and trade unions at all levels should regard the study, publicity, and implementation of the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party as a major political task for the current and future periods, earnestly study and comprehend the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech and the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues Concerning Persevering and Unremittingly Advancing Full and Rigorous Self-Governance of the Party," and implement it in light of actual conditions. It is necessary to further deeply understand the decisive significance of the Two Establishments (两个确立), continuously strengthen the Four Consciousnesses (四个意识), firm up the Four Confidences (四个自信), and achieve the Two Upholds (两个维护), and, with the actual results of persevering and unremittingly advancing full and rigorous self-governance of the Party, drive the high-quality development of trade union work, and make trade union contributions to comprehensively advancing the building of a strong country and the great cause of national rejuvenation through Chinese modernization.

Lu Zhiyuan, Secretary of the Party Leadership Group, Vice Chairman, and First Secretary of the Secretariat of the ACFTU, conveyed the spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Party.

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Joint Cultural Relics Exhibition Commemorating 90th Anniversary of Long March Victory Opens

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporter Wang Jue) To commemorate the 90th anniversary of the victory of the Long March of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, the joint exhibition "Their Names Endure, the Torch's Long Song — Joint Cultural Relics Exhibition Commemorating the 90th Anniversary of the Victory of the Long March of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army," co-hosted by the National Museum of China and the Martyrs' Memorial Facilities Protection Center of the Ministry of Veterans Affairs, opened at the National Museum of China on the 30th and will be open to the public starting on the 31st.

This exhibition was selected for the recommended list of themed exhibitions commemorating the 90th anniversary of the victory of the Long March of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, as published by the Central Propaganda Department, the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission, the Ministry of Veterans Affairs, and the National Cultural Heritage Administration. Through the narrative of five sections — "Bloody Campaign," "Forging the Army, Casting the Soul," "Spreading Far and Wide," "Passing on the Torch," and "Guardianship and Innovation" — the exhibition writes the wartime story of the Red Army breaking through blockades and fighting across ten thousand li, focuses on the path of building a strong army through ideological tempering and the consolidation of faith along the Long March, restores the vivid course of the Long March story's dissemination at home and abroad, and presents the passing on of the torch of spirit or tradition (薪火传承, xinhuo chuancheng - "firewood, torch") of generations of people commemorating the martyrs of the Long March and guarding the red memory.

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Themed Exhibition "Believing in the Party, Loving the Party — the Eternal 'Fourth Detachment'" Completes Installation in Yan'an

(Xinhua News Agency, Xi'an, October 29) (Reporter Liang Aiping) The themed exhibition "Believing in the Party, Loving the Party — the Eternal 'Fourth Detachment'" jointly organized by the China Executive Leadership Academy Yan'an and the Xinhua News Agency has recently completed its installation and been put into teaching use.

The exhibition closely revolves around fulfilling the Party's mission and tasks, tempering strong Party spirit, and focuses on the theme of "believing in the Party and loving the Party." It is divided into three thematic units — "Absolute Loyalty," "Having a Broad Perspective and Considering the Overall Interests," and "Rigorous and Realistic" — to tell the history of the Xinhua News Agency work team code-named the "Fourth Detachment" during the War of Liberation as it followed the Party Central Committee in its shift of operations across northern Shaanxi. It guides Party members and cadres to draw strength of faith, forge loyalty to the Party, carry forward fine traditions, and strengthen their sense of mission and responsibility from the spiritual qualities of the "Fourth Detachment" — believing in the Party, loving the Party, absolute loyalty, following the Party Central Committee, and striving and dedicating themselves.

Relying on the large quantity of precious historical materials, photographs, and documents stored in the Xinhua News Agency archives, the exhibition uses exhibits such as telegrams, photocopies of manuscripts, and historical photographs to let visitors truly feel the loyal character and striving spirit of the "Fourth Detachment."

At present, the China Executive Leadership Academy Yan'an has used the exhibition in the teaching of training classes such as the special training class for cadres managed by the central authorities and the training class for department- and bureau-level cadres, and has also developed supporting on-site lecture courses and special courses on Party spirit education. After visiting the exhibition, trainees expressed that the themed exhibition features precious and detailed historical materials and vivid and moving narration, and is a vivid lesson in loyalty to the Party education.

As the next step, the China Executive Leadership Academy Yan'an will take the themed exhibition as a driver to promote resource exploration, course development, research topics, and talent cultivation, effectively transforming exhibition resources into teaching resources, research resources, and educational resources, continuously enhancing the pertinence and effectiveness of Party spirit education, striving to build the themed exhibition into an important position for carrying forward the Yan'an spirit and continuing the red bloodline, and providing strong support for cultivating a high-caliber cadre contingent that is loyal, clean, and responsible.

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Taihang Mountain Produces "Golden Pearls" (Vitality in New Scenes · Exploring a Bumper Harvest in Golden Autumn)

By: 本报记者 郑洋洋

In the golden autumn season, the land of Qin County, Changzhi City, Shanxi Province, is brimming with the atmosphere of a bountiful harvest.

In the fields of Yanli Village, Dingchang Township, villager Liu Wanchun's 20 mu of "Qinzhou Yellow" millet is enjoying a bumper harvest. The grain ears are golden in color and full in grain, harvesters shuttle back and forth with roaring engines, and the freshly harvested millet is delivered directly to local enterprises at the edge of the fields.

"A great harvest!" Liu Wanchun said joyfully. He has adopted the order-based model, which guarantees a floor purchase price of 4 yuan per jin. The government provides a planting subsidy of 400 yuan per mu, and combined with improved seed varieties that increase yields, the net profit per mu can reach 2,000 yuan.

"Qinzhou Yellow" millet is the golden business card of Qin County. "Good mountains and good waters nurture good millet; as the folk saying goes, 'Gold beads, gold bead yellow, even gold beads cannot buy Qinzhou Yellow.'" Zhang Wei, director of the Qin County Agriculture and Rural Affairs Bureau, introduced. In recent years, the locality has continuously carried out seed improvement in cooperation with research institutes, and quality has been steadily enhanced.

In Baijiagou Village, Qinzhouhuang Town, the 3,000-mu "Qinzhou Yellow" millet improved-seed breeding base has reaped a bumper harvest. After villagers manually remove impurities in the fields, the "Qinhuang No. 3" harvested by machine will serve as production seed for the coming year.

Wang Feng, head of the base department of Shanxi Qinzhouhuang Millet (Group) Co., Ltd., introduced that "Qinhuang No. 3" was bred by the enterprise in conjunction with the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and features high yield, lodging resistance, and a short growth period. It is now being promoted to farmers through the order-based model.

"The enterprise supplies seeds and fertilizer uniformly and provides management and care guidance, so income has risen markedly." Liu Wanchun said that in the past the per-mu yield was only 300 jin, but now it has nearly doubled, and the purchase price is even more considerable.

According to reports, the coverage rate of improved millet seed in Qin County exceeds 95 percent, with full coverage of improved seed in suitable planting areas; the certified area for organic millet is 183,000 mu, and the certified area for green (eco-friendly) millet is 160,000 mu.

Behind the bumper harvest lie excellent quality, a continuously extending industrial chain, and a broad market.

Entering the service center of the "Qinzhouhuang Rural E-Town," a profusion of colorful and beautiful things (琳琅满目, lin lang man mu - "gem, jade, fill, eyes") of millet products greets the eye: gift boxes, cloth bags, and portable packs are all available, and deeply processed products such as millet biscuits, multigrain powder, and millet noodles are rich and varied. "Our products have already been sold to more than 20 countries and regions, including the United States and Canada," said Shi Lei, head of Shanxi Qinzhouhuang Millet (Group) Co., Ltd.

In recent years, Qin County has anchored onto the goals of "authentic seed sources, scaled-up planting, standardized processes, integrated industry, networked marketing, leading-enterprise dominance, and high-end branding," systematically building a full industrial chain. "Qinzhou Yellow" millet has been selected as a national famous, special, superior, and new agricultural product and as a Shanxi Province "Sanjin Time-Honored Brand." This year, the Shanxi Qin County millet planting system was selected for the eighth batch of China's Important Agricultural Heritage Systems.

"The total output value of the full 'Qinzhou Yellow' millet industrial chain has reached 1 billion yuan, with a brand value of 2 billion yuan." Zhang Wei introduced that the county has more than 30 millet-related enterprises and 591 cooperatives, and leading enterprises radiate to drive more than 30,000 farming households to increase income, with an average increase of 3,000 yuan per household. "During the 15th Five-Year Plan period, we will strive to bring the total output value of the full industrial chain to 3 billion yuan."

Amid the Taihang Mountains, grains of golden millet are adorning the picture of enriching the people through comprehensive rural revitalization.

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Photo Report

On October 30, the Qianhai Museum in Shenzhen, Guangdong, officially opened to the public. The first batch of exhibitions open to visitors includes the "Concise General History of Ancient China Exhibition," "Yao Guang Ying Shi — Ancient Chinese Jade Artifacts," "Yao Huo Ning Zhen — Ancient Chinese Porcelain," and the "Light of Civilization, Endless Growth and Development" digital exhibition. All four exhibitions are free of charge. The photo shows visitors viewing the exhibition.

Photo by Lei Sheng, People's Daily reporter

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Enhance Rural Road Traffic Safety

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporters Zhang Tianpei, Qu Xinming) Recently, the National Financial Regulatory Administration, together with the Ministry of Public Security, jointly issued the "Guiding Opinions on Deepening Police-Insurance Cooperation to Assist in the Governance of Hidden Dangers to Rural Road Traffic Safety."

The Guiding Opinions consist of four parts. First, encouraging consultation and joint governance. All localities are encouraged to actively explore coordinated governance. Insurance institutions are encouraged to decide, in light of their own actual circumstances and in accordance with the principle of voluntariness, whether to participate, and may adopt various models such as police-insurance co-construction to participate in governance. Second, enhancing the quality and effectiveness of governance. Public security traffic management departments in all localities conduct scientific research to form a list of hidden dangers to rural road traffic safety for governance; insurance institutions participate through consultation and steadily advance the governance of hidden dangers; both sides strengthen follow-up assessment of governance. Third, strengthening the empowerment of science and technology. In accordance with laws and regulations, promote the interconnection and exchange of data between public security traffic management and the insurance industry. Do a good job of risk monitoring and alerts, and statistical evaluation of rectification effectiveness. Strengthen the application of scientific and technological means. Fourth, strengthening organizational safeguards. The National Financial Regulatory Administration and the Ministry of Public Security establish a joint working mechanism to coordinate and advance the relevant work.

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Ministry of Civil Affairs and Others Deploy Visit and Care Services for Elderly Persons with Special Difficulties

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporter Wu Chuqi) The reporter learned from the Ministry of Civil Affairs: The Ministry of Civil Affairs, the National Working Commission on Aging, and the China National Committee on Aging recently issued the "Notice on Deeply Carrying out Visit and Care Services for Elderly Persons with Special Difficulties," which clearly designates elderly persons living alone, empty-nest elderly, left-behind elderly who are advanced in age or disabled, and others with relatively high safety risks as key targets, with visits to be conducted at least once every two weeks; where there is a genuine need, the frequency of visits may be further increased.

The notice proposes that routine visits comprehensively adopt such means as door-knocking visits, telephone contact, video calls, and remote intelligent monitoring, to proactively show concern, confirm safety, and understand and grasp the living conditions of elderly persons with special difficulties. Where hidden safety hazards in the home are discovered, timely risk alerts and safety reminders should be provided. In light of the wishes of the recipients of visit and care services and their actual needs for elderly care services, timely contact should be made with relevant elderly care service institutions; where other services are involved, active assistance should be provided in referring them to relevant organizations. Follow-up visits on services should be carried out to grasp the situation of service delivery and continuously improve the quality and effectiveness of services.

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CIIE Exhibits Find Their Way into Thousands of Households (CIIE Stories)

By: 本报记者 沈文敏

On the exhibition stands of the China International Import Expo (CIIE), many cutting-edge exhibits have moved from concept debut to market implementation. A hair dryer with infrared light energy from L'Oréal is one of them. From its global debut at the seventh CIIE to entering hair salons and ordinary households, its growth story is also a vivid microcosm of multinational beauty technology taking root in China and mutual efforts toward a common goal (双向奔赴, shuang xiang ben fu - "two ways, run towards") between Chinese and foreign innovation.

At the seventh China International Import Expo in 2024, this hair dryer equipped with infrared black technology made its debut at the L'Oréal booth. Unlike traditional devices that rely on high temperatures to dry hair, this hair dryer integrates infrared light with high-speed airflow, shortening the time of high-temperature drying, locking in moisture while quickly drying hair, and reducing heat damage. Long lines formed in front of the booth, and many hairstylists tried it on site. At that time, it was still just a cutting-edge exhibit co-developed with a Chinese startup and had not yet been officially released to the domestic market.

The spotlight of the CIIE brought a key turning point for this new tech product. Relying on the expo platform, the L'Oréal team collected trial feedback from professional hairstylists and ordinary consumers, repeatedly adjusted temperature control modes and wind speed settings, and optimized parameters for consumers with fine, soft, permed, or color-damaged hair. Just a few months later, this hair dryer smoothly completed registration and approval, officially entered the Chinese market, and received unending and continuous (源源不断, yuan yuan bu duan - "source, source, not, continuous") orders both online and offline, transforming from an exhibit on the stand into a hot item in the hair care circle.

"The CIIE is the expo where L'Oréal invests the most globally," said Lan Zhenzhen (兰珍珍), President of Public Affairs for L'Oréal North Asia and China. She frankly noted that the CIIE is no longer just a product display window, but also an ecosystem of open innovation. "Here we complete new product launches and debuts, connect with local startups and e-commerce channels, and understand Chinese consumer demand. In the past, much innovation spread from the West to the East, but now, the needs of Chinese consumers are rewriting L'Oréal's global R&D roadmap in reverse." In her view, the popularity of this hair dryer is precisely the result of Chinese and foreign enterprises jointly creating on the CIIE platform.

The breakout success of a light-energy hair dryer is by no means an isolated case. Relying on the CIIE platform, products from multiple L'Oréal brands including CeraVe have successively completed the transformation from exhibit stand items to national bestsellers. Overseas cutting-edge technology meets local innovation strength, imported new products quickly connect with the vast domestic consumer market, and the CIIE story of "exhibits becoming commodities, commodities becoming hit products" continues to unfold.

From innovative exhibits under the spotlight of the exhibition stand to hair care items entering thousands of households, the open stage allows global innovation achievements to take root and flourish locally (落地生根, luo di sheng gen - "fall, ground, grow, root"), and the vast Chinese market continues to provide multinational enterprises with unending and continuous development opportunities.

The CIIE continues to release its spillover effects, and high-level opening up is continuously cultivating fertile soil for global industrial innovation.

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China's First Carrier-Based Reconnaissance-Strike Integrated Stealth UAV Successfully Takes Off and Lands on the Sichuan

(People's Daily, Beijing, October 30) (Reporter Jin Zhengbo) The reporter learned from the relevant departments of the Navy: China's first carrier-based reconnaissance-strike integrated stealth unmanned aerial vehicle, the "Attack-21," recently completed its first takeoff and landing on the Sichuan, China's first Type 076 amphibious assault ship. This is another breakthrough in the development of China's amphibious assault ships, marking that the Chinese Navy now possesses the capability for fixed-wing stealth UAVs to take off and land on large maritime combat platforms.

The Navy's Sichuan, hull number 51, is the lead ship of the Type 076 amphibious assault ship, independently designed, researched, and built by China. It innovatively applies a fully automatic landing guidance system, a new type of integrated electric power system, and electromagnetic catapult and arresting gear technology, and can carry fixed-wing UAVs, helicopters, and other aircraft.

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Page editors: Kang Yan, Liu Juanxi, Wang Bo

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Invisible "Micro Energy," Visible Big Future (Academician Explains Science)

By: 本报记者 王昊男

Just shake the small box in your hand, and the LED light connected to it by wires lights up instantly. There is no external power source, and no traditional magnet and coil — where does the electricity come from?

At the Beijing Institute of Nanoenergy and Nanosystems of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, located in Huairou Science City, wondrous power-generation scenarios exist everywhere in large numbers (比比皆是, bi bi jie shi - "compare, compare, all, are"): walking, waving a hand, surging seawater, a gentle breeze, even shaking a piece of clothing — all can generate electricity.

"Whether it is thermal power, hydropower, or nuclear power, human power generation is essentially driving the flow of electrons." Wang Zhonglin, foreign academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and director of the Beijing Institute of Nanoenergy and Nanosystems of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and his team are exploring a brand-new power-generation model — triboelectric nanogeneration. "Let materials directly produce electricity when they rub, bend, or are squeezed, and go from electrification to power generation," Wang Zhonglin said.

What is special about this new power-generation technology? What new applications lie behind it? What role does it play in China's energy development? Recently, a reporter conducted an exclusive interview with Academician Wang Zhonglin.

Triboelectric charging + electrostatic induction = triboelectric nanogeneration

When you take off a sweater in winter, it crackles; a comb that has been run through hair can pick up bits of paper. These familiar phenomena of triboelectric charging are precisely the underlying logic of triboelectric nanogeneration.

"When two different materials come into contact and then separate, their surfaces respectively carry positive and negative charges; when an external force makes them repeatedly approach, separate, or slide against each other, a changing voltage is formed, thereby pushing electrons in the circuit to flow back and forth, and so mechanical motion is turned into electricity," Wang Zhonglin said. The familiar "triboelectric charging" plus "electrostatic induction" forms triboelectric nanogeneration, he explained.

What is the difference between triboelectric nanogeneration and traditional power generation?

"Traditional power generation is 'concentrated conversion of strong energy' — burning coal, damming water, capturing wind, gathering large-scale energy to a single point and releasing it," Wang Zhonglin said. It is like using a dam to hold back an entire river. "Triboelectric nanogeneration takes another path, called 'precise capture of weak energy,' equivalent to placing a miniature waterwheel in every small stream — no matter how small the current, it can still turn."

Triboelectric nanogeneration also has a characteristic: it is "not picky about what it eats." Wang Zhonglin explained that thermal power, photovoltaics, and wind power depend on specific sites or specific climates and are "centralized power generation"; triboelectric nanogeneration is not picky about scenarios or about the magnitude of energy — human motion, the rise and fall of ocean waves, and mechanical vibration can all be made use of from local resources (就地取材, jiu di cai qu - "at, place, take, material"), making it more like "distributed micro power stations" spread across many places.

A windmill only a few dozen centimeters tall — just blow a breath of air at it, and the light bulb connected to it lights up. "Traditional wind turbines generally need wind of force three or above to generate electricity; triboelectric nanogenerators need no magnet and no coil — a little wind is enough," Wang Zhonglin said. This also fills the gap in micro-energy utilization that traditional power-generation technology cannot cover, "a new expansion of the classic electromagnetic application scenarios."

At the theoretical level, triboelectric nanogeneration technology has also given rise to and driven a series of important fundamental scientific breakthroughs. Traditional power generation is based on conduction current theory; the theoretical foundation of the triboelectric nanogenerator is the displacement current in Maxwell's equations. "It is equivalent to turning the everyday phenomenon of 'triboelectric charging' into a systematizable, engineerable power-generation mechanism — something no one before has done systematically," Wang Zhonglin said.

Triboelectric charging mechanisms, contact-electrification-induced catalysis, liquid-solid interface electrification; tribotronics, piezotronics, piezo-phototronics... As research has deepened, Wang Zhonglin and his team have also systematically integrated a series of discovered physical effects with existing disciplines, founding "dynamic interface electronics."

"In the past, electronics studied how electrons run inside materials; now it has expanded to studying the electrical processes by which interfaces generate, regulate, and catalyze during dynamic contact," Wang Zhonglin said. "This is an exploratory innovation at the level of fundamental physics."

Outside the laboratory, what can triboelectric nanogeneration do?

Have you ever seen a keyboard that "recognizes people"? The Beijing Institute of Nanoenergy and Nanosystems of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has one. The password — 3.1415926 — is posted in a conspicuous spot right next to the computer. The reporter typed it out key by key, but the screen prompted: verification failed.

"The password is correct, but if the speed and force do not match, you cannot pass verification," the staff member revealed. A triboelectric nanogenerator is embedded in the keyboard; the force and rhythm of each keystroke are converted into electrical signals, forming a second lock beyond the password. "A password can be stolen, but a person's 'hand strength' when typing cannot be stolen."

Stepping into the exhibition hall on the first floor of the institute is like entering a "store of the future." Smart shoes with embedded triboelectric nanogenerators can count steps and provide positioning, powered entirely by walking; a mattress with 120 array points can identify body weight, breathing, and heart rate in less than one second, with an identification accuracy of 98 percent; an air purifier that needs no filter replacement uses the electrostatic field generated by friction from air flow to adsorb and break down harmful substances, achieving a sterilization and virus-killing rate of up to 99.99 percent.

Applications in the medical and health field are the most compelling. Wearable medical monitoring, neurological disease diagnosis, adjuvant therapy for cancer... With the advantages of "self-powering" and "high-sensitivity sensing" afforded by triboelectric nanogeneration technology, many diagnostic and therapeutic methods are breaking free from the constraints of batteries.

In the laboratory, even more "heavyweight" products are being refined at an accelerated pace. "In the construction of the 'six networks' deployed by the state, our technology can solve the pain points of 'difficult power supply and difficult operation and maintenance' in infrastructure sensing," Wang Zhonglin said. In scenarios such as underground utility corridors without light and ice-covered mountainous areas, triboelectric nanogeneration technology can efficiently convert breeze-induced vibration, bridge expansion and contraction, and raindrop impact into electrical energy, enabling monitoring terminals to operate passively with "self-energy harvesting, self-sensing, and self-transmission."

In the field of new-type power grids, the self-powered line monitoring device developed by the institute has achieved power generation at the 10-milliwatt level, with the average power consumption of multi-parameter sensing as low as 700 microwatts. "It has been installed successively on lines at voltage levels from 110 kilovolts to 500 kilovolts, and has passed a 100-day live-operation test," Wang Zhonglin said.

How can theories on the "bookshelf" be moved onto the "store shelf"?

To the southwest of the institute, in a not very large standalone building, "waves surge." In the wave-making pool, a yellow buoy rises and falls, and the screen on the buoy stays lit the whole time.

"The ocean holds enormous renewable energy potential, with the global theoretical total of wave energy reaching several terawatts," Wang Zhonglin said. How to efficiently capture low-frequency, irregular ocean energy has always been a technical bottleneck. "Triboelectric nanogeneration technology happens to excel at collecting low-frequency, disordered ocean wave energy, with a simple structure, strong environmental adaptability, and relatively low material costs."

Starting in 2023, Wang Zhonglin sent his laboratory team out to sea. In the first sea trial for power generation, the peak power density reached 120 watts per cubic meter, with an average power density of 22 watts per cubic meter. In 2025, trials of a 1-cubic-meter single-unit power generation device began, and this year the peak power has reached the kilowatt level.

"Next, we will conduct power generation and grid-connection tests, with the initial goal of completing a kilowatt-level demonstration application." Wang Zhonglin has a timetable in mind: within 5 to 10 years, develop marine blue energy into a brand-new zero-carbon-emission large-scale energy model after wind power and photovoltaics.

The sea can give us far more than this. "Triboelectric nanogeneration technology can help realize self-powered monitoring of the ocean, and in turn help build an ocean self-powered Internet of Things system," Wang Zhonglin said.

"By deploying high-density self-powered smart buoys across a large sea area to form a distributed sensor network, the maritime Internet of Things will have a stable power supply," Wang Zhonglin said. From real-time monitoring of marine ranches and submarine pipelines to automatic monitoring, tracking, and identification of vessels, "this will play an important role in promoting a maritime power."

From walking alone to walking with many, more and more researchers are beginning to pay attention to triboelectric nanogeneration. Wang Zhonglin said that as of the end of 2025, more than 100 countries and regions, more than 4,300 research units, and 22,000 scholars worldwide had published research papers in this field, and at least 5,000 scholars are engaged in research in the field of piezotronics.

"Our focus is to move these original technologies and achievements from the 'bookshelf' onto the 'store shelf,' demonstrating greater value in industrial application and in benefiting humanity," Wang Zhonglin said.

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Frontier research and our daily lives: what’s the connection? (Science Chat)

By: 陈 征

The 2026 Nobel Prizes were announced one after another not long ago: the Physics Prize was awarded to Francis Halzen, who proposed detecting neutrinos with Antarctic ice; the Chemistry Prize was awarded to Henri B. Kagan and Kenzi shared the prize for the discovery of nonlinear effects and autocatalysis in asymmetric organic synthesis;and the Physiology or Medicine Prize was awarded to Karl Deisseroth, Peter Hegemann, and Georg Nagel in recognition of their discoveries in light-gated ion channels and optogenetics... But the obscure terminology and highly specialized knowledge make one cannot help but wonder: what relevance do these cutting-edge studies have to our daily lives?

Basic science at its birth is often "useless learning." In the 19th century, Oersted's discovery that a small magnetic needle beside a current-carrying wire deflects, and Faraday's demonstration of the "copper disc experiment," all seemed far removed from daily life. But when we stretch the timeline out, we find that what has brought enormous changes to human daily life has mostly developed from those basic research results that people at the time "could not understand and did not know what use they had."

To give an example, this year's Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to results related to neutrino detection — this is a new way of exploring the universe and understanding the world, and at present we do not know what connection it has to daily life. But go back to 1901, and the "X-rays" that won the first Nobel Prize in Physics now have innumerable (数不胜数, shu bu sheng shu - "count, not, win, number") applications in today's production and daily life.

Beyond the X-ray films and CT scans commonly seen in medicine and the X-ray machines used for security in public places, Nobel Prize results and applications related to X-rays also profoundly influence the present day. Max von Laue discovered X-ray diffraction, and the Braggs, father and son, used it for crystal structure analysis, providing the essential analytical means for the development of all kinds of new materials today; Charles Barkla discovered the characteristic X-rays of elements, and Karl Siegbahn established X-ray spectroscopy, helping us analyze the elemental composition of ores, soils, alloys, and even cultural relics — it is an indispensable testing method for R&D ranging from metallurgy, archaeology, and environmental monitoring to semiconductor chips and battery materials.

In the life sciences, some scientists previously used X-ray crystal structure analysis to determine protein molecules, some used it to resolve molecules such as penicillin, vitamin B12, and insulin, and still other scientists used it to reveal the double-helix structure of DNA, pushing biology down to the molecular level and laying the foundation for today's synthesis of new drugs, design of targeted drugs, and vaccine development.

It can be said that in many fields, there are continuations of the results of that time. The optical fiber that won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2009 is the foundation of today's Internet of Everything and global interconnection; the blue LED that won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2014 has been widely applied in every corner of lighting and display; the lithium battery that won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2019 is propping up the development of the new-energy industry... The connection between these results, which seemed abstruse and profound at the time, and our everyday lives often takes a certain amount of time to become apparent.

Basic research has a long cycle and shows no returns in the short term, but it is precisely the foundation of future technology. Let us look forward to the surprises and changes that those seemingly very distant studies will bring to our lives in the future.

(The author is a council member of the board of the China Association of Science Popularizers and a professor at the School of Physical Science and Engineering of Beijing Jiaotong University)

Academic support: China Association for Science and Technology

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Hard X-ray Free-Electron Laser Facility Achieves First Lasing

(Xinhua News Agency, Shanghai) (Reporter Dong Xue) The reporter learned from ShanghaiTech University that the construction of the hard X-ray free-electron laser facility, a major national scientific and technological infrastructure project, has achieved breakthrough progress. The facility employs an electron beam generated by a 4 GeV continuous-wave superconducting linear accelerator to drive 18 undulator lines, each 4 meters long with a magnetic period of 55 millimeters, and has successfully achieved first lasing of the free-electron laser.

As a scientific research tool that illuminates the microscopic world, the hard X-ray free-electron laser facility is like a "super camera" capable of shooting "molecular movies" that record rapid movements in the microscopic world.

Construction of the hard X-ray free-electron laser facility began in April 2018. Upon completion, the electron energy of the hard X-ray free-electron laser facility's accelerator will reach 8 GeV. The first phase of two undulator lines will be able to produce free-electron laser radiation with photon energies covering 0.2 to 15 keV, with light pulses as short as the femtosecond scale and a maximum repetition rate of up to 1 MHz. The facility can precisely capture rapid dynamic change processes of atoms and molecules, and will provide cutting-edge research tools such as microscopic structure analysis and ultrafast dynamics research for frontier scientific fields including life sciences, quantum materials, and future energy.

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Relying on Its "Eyes," This Robot Walks Autonomously (On the Front Line)

By: 本报记者 黄晓慧

At the site of the 26th China International Industry Fair held in Shanghai, a white robot with "big eyes" and a chassis resembling that of a Mars rover attracted people's attention. With crowds flowing and the scene complex at the exhibition, this robot had no pre-set map, was not controlled by a handheld remote, and relied solely on its "eyes" to find its own way, actively avoid pedestrians, and "tour the exhibition" together with visitors.

This robot, named "Danbao" (see photo, taken by Wei Pengfei), is equipped with a pure-vision on-device brain, jointly developed by Fudan University's School of Future Information Innovation and the Jimu Tianshu team. Zhang Tianzi, head of the R&D team, introduced that for a long time, robot movement and operations have mainly relied on three methods — remote control, pre-programming, and pre-mapping — rather than the robot's own real-time understanding of its environment. Once the environment or task undergoes major changes, re-mapping or re-programming is required. In operation scenarios such as emergency rescue and disaster relief (抢险救灾, qiang xian jiu zai - "rob, danger, rescue, disaster") and space mining, where there are many variable factors, robots capable of real-time environmental understanding and autonomous decision-making are urgently needed.

The birth of "Danbao" benefits from a technological breakthrough in the pure-vision robot on-device brain. At the model level, the team unified various robot movements into the "navigation" problem: moving is navigating the body to a target position, while operations such as grasping are navigating the fingertip to near the target object. Many robots use two different systems for grasping and walking, which suffer from poor data consistency and relatively high costs, whereas "Danbao's" brain can command whole-body movement. Based on the aforementioned "on-device brain," a physical skill for embodied navigation — visual-spatial intelligent navigation — has been trained and is now running stably on "Danbao."

Zhang Tianzi said that low computing power requirements and high intelligence are another feature of visual-spatial intelligent navigation. Currently, the parameter scale of large models for embodied intelligent navigation is mostly in the billions, demanding high computing power, and some solutions rely on off-device inference, making them difficult to deploy directly on existing robot bodies. Visual-spatial intelligent navigation has approximately 120 million parameters and can support real-time on-device operation of up to eight visual inputs within a power consumption of under 20 watts, enabling robots to break free from dependence on pre-built maps and pre-set programs and move toward autonomous "understanding," decision-making, and action.

At present, the R&D team is adapting the results to multiple types of robots for errand delivery and pickup, inspection, agriculture, cleaning, and other applications. In the future, they will explore enabling robots to continuously "evolve" from autonomous movement to autonomously completing tasks, and then to understanding intent.

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Building a "bridge" to awaken the "dormant" body (Frontline Report)

By: 本报记者 吴 君

In the ward of Tongji Hospital, affiliated with Tongji Medical College of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Ms. Hu, who has high-level paraplegia, lies in bed, gazing at a specific area of the screen. Through eye-tracking combined with focused intention, the computer cursor immediately moves with precision. What makes this scene possible is precisely the brain-computer interface device.

In August this year, under the operation of the team of Professor Tang Zhouping, Professor Shu Kai, and Associate Professor Hu Feng, eight ultra-flexible electrodes, each thinner than an ordinary human hair in diameter, were precisely implanted into the motor cortex of Ms. Hu's brain, completing this fully invasive brain-computer interface surgery.

For patients with spinal cord injuries and similar conditions, damage to neural pathways is like severing the "information bridge" between the brain and the limbs. Although the patient is fully conscious (意识清醒, yi shi qing xing - "consciousness, clear"), the command to "move" cannot be transmitted through the original neural pathways to the limbs, leaving the body in a state of "slumber." "The brain-computer interface device acts like a 'bridge,' bypassing the damaged neural pathways," Tang Zhouping explained. "The chip and electrodes establish a new information pathway between the brain and the outside world, capable of capturing the patient's neural discharges indicating 'intent to move' within milliseconds, which, after decoding, are converted into specific actions."

In addition to the invasive approach, brain-computer interfaces currently also have two other technical routes: non-invasive and semi-invasive. "Invasive interfaces offer high signal quality and large bandwidth, but demand high safety and long-term stability; non-invasive interfaces are safe, convenient, repeatable, and low-cost, but the signals are weak and individual differences are large; semi-invasive interfaces provide an intermediate path," Tang Zhouping said. Which mode to choose must be determined based on the individual patient's circumstances.

Beyond improving motor dysfunction in patients with limb disabilities, brain-computer interfaces also demonstrate important clinical intervention value in the field of neuropsychiatric diseases.

"The brain signals of such patients issue erroneous commands, leading to symptoms such as involuntary body movements, emotional dysregulation, or cognitive impairment," Tang Zhouping explained. Relying on the precise regulation and neurofeedback training enabled by brain-computer interfaces, patients can, through repeated stimulation and practice, gradually rebuild normal brain rhythms and functional order.

However, neural signal characteristics vary significantly among individuals and their dynamic changes are complex. For brain-computer interfaces to achieve stable and reliable clinical application, it remains necessary to overcome challenges in "deciphering brain signals," including the fidelity of signal acquisition, the generalizability of algorithmic models, and the clinical value of technological outcomes. "For brain-computer interfaces to truly land in clinical practice, it is necessary to establish a complete chain from brain signal acquisition, decoding algorithms, and neural regulation, to clinical trials, rehabilitation evaluation, and medical device translation," Tang Zhouping said.

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Domestic satellite internet bridges the 'last blind spot' in global communications

(People's Daily, Beijing) (Reporter Liu Shiyao) The reporter learned from the Ministry of Natural Resources that the "Polar" vessel, which is carrying out China's 16th Arctic Ocean expedition, has completed quasi-operational application testing of domestic satellite internet along Arctic shipping routes.

With the joint efforts of the Polar Research Institute of China (China Institute of Polar Research) and other units, this voyage successfully conducted for the first time interconnected communication verification linking the Arctic, Antarctica, and the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. In the video link-up among the "Polar" vessel, the Qinling Station, the Lhasa River test station in the Tibet Autonomous Region, and the North China Sea Bureau, voice and images were clear and smooth, achieving global low-latency, high-bandwidth communication via domestic satellite internet. This verified the stability of the domestic satellite internet communication system under diverse harsh environments including extreme low temperatures, high altitude, strong wind and sand, and ice fog, and opened up the "last blind zone" of global communication.

Based on domestic satellite internet communication technology, this voyage has cumulatively sent and received more than 300 files, with data volume exceeding 100 GB, supported more than 40 video consultations, and successfully completed full-scenario communication tests including voice calls, large-volume data file transmission, ship-to-shore video consultations, localization of survey equipment data transmission, and continuous online operation of the forecasting platform throughout the entire voyage.

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China Makes Progress in Breeding Rice Tolerant to Extreme High and Low Temperatures

(People's Daily report) (Reporter Yang Xun) Recently, the China Association of Agricultural Science Societies organized experts from the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, China Agricultural University, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and other units to conduct on-site inspection and evaluation of the rice sterile line Ji 233S, which is tolerant to extreme temperatures, and its series of hybrid combinations, jointly developed by the Hunan Hybrid Rice Research Center, Hunan Agricultural University, Beijing Golden Nonghua Seed Industry Technology Co., Ltd., and other units, in planting trials for tolerance to extreme high temperatures and extreme low temperatures conducted respectively in the Hunan plain region and the Yunnan high-altitude region. The expert group concluded that Ji 233S has strong tolerance to extreme high and low temperatures, and the seed-setting rates of its combinations are significantly higher than those of the control, indicating high application value.

Tang Wenbang, chief scientist of the team and president of Hunan Agricultural University, introduced that the team has currently established an innovative technological system for rice tolerant to extreme high/low temperatures, spanning from gene mining, germplasm creation, and variety breeding to demonstration and promotion, which is expected to provide new varieties and technological support for China's rice to cope with global warming and the frequent occurrence of extreme temperatures.

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Page editors: Xiao Yao, Dong Yingxue, Yin Yan

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Poly Development Holdings: Building High-Quality Homes with the "Three-Good" System

At present, China's real estate market is undergoing profound transformation, with supply-demand relations experiencing major changes. Product strength, service strength, and delivery strength have become key variables influencing homebuyers' decisions.

In order to better adapt to the requirements of the new stage of housing development and meet consumers' demand for quality living, Poly Development Holdings has put forward a new brand proposition, "Three-Good Poly, Living with Heart," building a value system of "Good Products—Good Services—Good Living" (the "Three-Good" system for short), and using solid product strength, service strength, and delivery strength to create high-quality residences.

Transparent Factory: Making the "Good Product" Standard Visible

In April 2026, Poly Development Holdings released the brand proposition "Three-Good Poly, Living with Heart." Among its elements, "with heart" is interpreted as a threefold commitment of "understanding, craftsmanship, and constancy"—namely, understanding user needs, polishing products to strict standards, and providing full-cycle services. "Good Products," as the foundation of the "Three-Good" system, supports Poly Development Holdings' transformation from "creating good products" to "cultivating good living."

The "Three-Good" system is the crystallization of Poly Development Holdings' more than 30 years of market accumulation. Through cross-validation of in-depth household interviews with typical customers and community surveys, Poly Development Holdings has transformed residential experience into systematic research and development capability, advancing performance standards, spatial planning, and environmental creation in a coordinated manner to match the daily living habits of different families.

As a demonstration project for the implementation of the "Three-Good" system, Poly Yuexi Bay [Guangzhou Housing Pre-sale (Online) Permit No. 20250442] places the focus of "Good Products" on transparency in construction—not limited to conceptual promotion, but opening concealed works and material standards to the public. In the "Transparent Factory" created by the project, pipeline laying, waterproofing techniques, and material details can be directly inspected. All materials entering the site are accompanied by test reports and traceability codes, and key processes implement a "one household, one file" record, making the construction process verifiable. This is an innovative exploration by Poly Development Holdings to push quality control from internal standards toward a public arena where it can be inspected.

In terms of specific techniques, the project focuses on common residential pain points such as leakage, smoke cross-contamination, and odor return in traditional housing, implementing the "Three-Zero Techniques" system to make concealed works solid and meticulous.

Addressing pipeline leakage. The whole-house water supply pipes are upgraded to corrosion-resistant materials, and drainage pipe connections adopt hot-melt joining so that pipes merge into one integrated whole, eliminating the hidden danger of leakage at the source; the bathroom adopts double waterproofing combined with crack-resistant slope design, building a solid dry barrier. Inside the "Transparent Factory," the project has also specially set up a waterproofing comparison experiment, making techniques originally hidden underground directly visible and verifiable.

Addressing smoke cross-contamination. Targeting the pain point of "when the neighbor cooks, you smell it in your own home," the kitchen flue adopts 304 stainless steel flue pipes with high sealing and anti-aging properties, with checks at every level from material selection and installation to joint sealing.

Addressing bathroom odor. The project carefully plans a systematic design from floor drains to each drainage node, using ingenious water replenishment and trap technology to prevent odor from returning.

In addition, the project integrates the "Eight Balances" healthy ecosystem. Whether outdoors it is extreme weather conditions (严寒酷暑, yan han ku shu - "severe, cold; fierce, hot") or noisy and chaotic, once doors and windows are closed, indoor temperature, humidity, air, and acoustic indicators can all be properly regulated. Combined with the "Ten Major Techniques" that cleverly conceal the complex equipment and pipelines, the living space maintains a comfortable visual experience.

Poly Development Holdings believes that "Good Products" are ultimately constituted by a series of quantifiable and verifiable engineering facts. Through the "Transparent Factory" and systematic investment in techniques, Poly Yuexi Bay makes the standard of "Good Products" perceptible and traceable, allowing users to live with greater peace of mind and experience greater comfort.

Long-Termism: Realizing "Good Services" and "Good Living"

If "Good Products" solves the problem of "physical space," then "Good Services" and "Good Living" comprehensively take into account humanistic factors—this is also the ultimate anchoring point of Poly Development Holdings' "Three-Good" system.

At the level of "Good Services," Poly Yuexi Bay provides owners with a companionship chain running through the entire life cycle. The project introduces the Golden Key certification system, configures an N-to-1 butler team and a 24-hour response mechanism, and establishes "one household, one file" full-life-cycle maintenance. From transparency of construction progress to owner open days, from in-depth communication before delivery to asset protection after move-in, "Good Services" becomes a solid bridge connecting owners and the community.

At the level of "Good Living," the project is committed to making the community a warm neighborhood community. Poly Yuexi Bay encourages owners who love sports to take the lead, while the project team provides full support from venues to service resources. At present, communities such as tennis and urban jogging established by owners have begun to take shape, further enriching daily life in the community. In addition, the project operations team has also carried out in-depth visits "into owners' enterprises," promoting cross-industry exchanges and resource sharing among owners and continuously enhancing the community's cohesion.

This community management based on long-termism, through the dual accumulation of products and services, is gradually transformed into Poly Development Holdings' brand advantage, accumulating momentum for the project's development.

Implementing "Living with Heart" through "Three-Good Poly"

Poly Yuexi Bay's achievements stem from the superposition of product quality, service systems, and community relations. Poly answers with the "Three-Good" system, using solid techniques, a transparent attitude, and long-term companionship to provide the national real estate market with a vivid case of building high-quality residences.

From "Three-Good Poly" to "Living with Heart" is not only a pursuit at the level of product technology, but also a responsibility toward residents. As a central state-owned enterprise development entity, Poly Development Holdings will continue to practice the construction approach of "Good Products—Good Services—Good Living," implementing its thinking on human settlement into the details of every project, and continuously exploring feasible paths for high-quality human settlement construction.

Data source: Poly Development Holdings

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Tektites: A "Survival Tool" for Lingnan's Ancient Peoples (Archaeology in China)

By: 刘颖杰 邢 松

Standing among the karst peak forests of the Zuojiang River basin in Guangxi, the hot and humid wind carries the scent of vegetation and brushes against one's face. Here, the summer is long, hot, and humid, with lush vegetation, towering rocky mountains, and winding rivers. Today, what was once wilderness has become home. But tens of thousands of years ago, when humans first set foot on this land, how did they manage to survive?

In 2019, an archaeological survey team from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences discovered the Jidao Paleolithic site cluster in Fusui County, Chongzuo City, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, and, in collaboration with the Guangxi Institute of Cultural Relics Protection and Archaeology and Peking University, carried out archaeological work there over a period of seven years. The related new findings have attracted widespread attention. The representative site of the cluster—Jidao No. 1—has a stratigraphic chronology spanning from 36,000 to 8,000 years ago, and has yielded multiple burials and rich traces of fire use, with more than 1,000 human fossils, tens of thousands of stone artifacts and animal bone fragments, large quantities of freshwater snail and clam shells, as well as hundreds of pieces of ochre, plant seeds, and other abundant remains. It is the earliest prehistoric burial cluster found in China and even in East Asia, and it is also the Paleolithic site with the largest number of human fossils discovered in China to date.

One of the site's most striking discoveries is a batch of distinctive cultural artifacts—more than 15,000 stone artifacts made from tektites. These small, black, translucent stones have opened a brand-new window for decoding the lithic technology and survival strategies of the ancient inhabitants of the Zuojiang River basin.

Although the Chinese name of tektite contains the word "meteorite," it is not truly a "visitor from beyond the sky." Approximately 700,000 years ago, a meteorite impact event occurred, during which surface sediments on Earth were melted and ejected by the impact, then cooled, forming natural silicate glass bodies scattered across the region from China's southeastern coast to Southeast Asia and Australia. Tektites come in a variety of shapes, including teardrop, dumbbell, sphere, disc, and irregular block forms, ranging in size from a few millimeters to more than ten centimeters. Their Mohs hardness is 6.5–7, and their fractures are conchoidal, making them extremely sharp. Thanks to this property, from tens of thousands of years ago to several thousand years ago, tektites became a precious production material and a "survival tool" for the ancient inhabitants of Lingnan.

Tektite artifacts have been unearthed from every natural layer of the site. Across the three cultural phases, tektite artifacts account for 94.7%, 98.4%, and 89.7% of the stone artifacts, respectively.

Making tools from this raw material was not easy: tektite raw nodules are relatively small in size, making them difficult to hold while detaching flakes; flakes produced by direct hard-hammer percussion are mostly small and fragmented, and difficult to process and utilize. Experiments show that the ancient inhabitants used the bipolar technique, placing the tektite on an anvil stone, using one hand to secure the raw material and adjust its position and angle, while the other hand swung a hammerstone downward to strike and detach flakes. This required precise control of force, because tektite is highly brittle—every blow generates internal cracks—so the flaking action had to be precise, accurate, and forceful, and had to be completed within a limited number of strikes; otherwise, the raw nodule would shatter. In addition, if the angle and force of the strike were improper, large quantities of tiny, sharp flying fragments could injure the knapper and others nearby. Only by making a reasonable plan before flaking and delivering a single strike at exactly the right moment or in the right way (恰到好处, qia dao hao chu - "just, arrive, good, point") could one obtain a flake of moderate size with thin, sharp edges—a flake that could be used without retouching or with only simple retouching.

The tektite tools unearthed at the Jidao No. 1 site are diverse in type, including scrapers, shouldered perforators, notched tools, and others, capable of performing multiple functions such as scraping, cutting, piercing, drilling, and incising. This shows that the ancient inhabitants of the area had fully mastered the properties of tektite and the techniques for knapping it. Many of the unearthed stone artifacts have small notches along their edges, indicating that they may have been bound with bamboo, wood, or other materials to form composite tools, compensating for the limitation of their small size, which made it difficult to achieve multiple functions when used by hand alone.

In terms of chronological span, at the Jidao site cluster, tektite artifacts extend from 36,000 years ago to 8,000 years ago, running through the period before and after the Last Glacial Maximum. At Neolithic sites such as Chongtang and Dingsishan, considerable quantities of tektite artifacts have also been found, indicating that this lithic tradition was not interrupted but continued stably.

In terms of geographical extent, across the entire Lingnan region, tektite artifacts have been found at the Chongtang site in the Zuojiang River basin, the Yahuaidong site in the Youjiang River basin, the Dingsishan site in the Yongjiang River basin, the Fengyan site in Liuzhou, and as far afield as the Luobidong site on Hainan Island. From the mountains and forests of Guangxi to the shores of the South China Sea, tektites were collected and utilized by ancient inhabitants throughout Lingnan.

In northern China, the picture was quite different. By approximately 28,000 to 26,000 years ago, microblade technology remains had appeared in both Northeast and North China. Thereafter, microblade technology spread rapidly, took full root in northern China and even the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau region, and continued to be used during the Neolithic. By contrast, the tektite artifacts of Lingnan are merely simple core-and-flake technology products, far less standardized and refined than blades and microblades. So why did these somewhat "crude" stone artifacts persist in Lingnan for tens of thousands of years without being replaced?

Behind this "crudeness" lies a different logic of survival. As a high-quality raw material, tektite fully possessed the technological potential to be worked into microblades or other refined stone tools, yet the ancient inhabitants of Lingnan did not do so. The reason may lie in "no need." Lingnan was densely forested, crisscrossed by river networks, and rich in animal and plant resources. The existing tool kit was sufficient to meet daily needs, and the ancient inhabitants lacked the pressure and motivation to develop more complex technological systems. If the microblade remains represent the "seeking change" of the highly mobile northern inhabitants, then the tektite artifacts represent the "maintaining constancy" of the southern inhabitants living in a stable climatic environment. The two strategies embody the different survival wisdoms of ancient peoples responding to diverse environments.

Over tens of thousands of years, seemingly simple tools supported the ancient inhabitants through the long journey from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic, and they have also become a unique sample for interpreting the ancient survival rules of Lingnan.

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Safeguarding Urban Cultural Heritage, Continuing the Chinese Civilization

By: 张 杰

Recently, the "15th Five-Year Plan for Cultural Heritage Protection and Inheritance" (hereinafter referred to as the "Plan") was officially issued. As a programmatic document in the field of cultural heritage during the 15th Five-Year Plan period, this Plan takes Xi Jinping's cultural thought as its fundamental guide, anchors the goal of basically forming a comprehensive cultural heritage protection pattern by 2030, and marks the entry of China's cultural heritage governance into a brand-new stage.

The urban cultural lineage is an important testimony to Chinese civilization. Safeguarding the urban cultural lineage across the land of China means preserving the non-renewable historical roots of Chinese civilization — this is the key concern of the Plan's deployment of systematic protection of cultural heritage. The first prominent feature of the Plan is its completeness and systematicity: for the first time at the national level, it establishes a complete working framework for the entire field of cultural heritage, opens up the governance chain from resource surveys to supervision and accountability, breaks down the working barriers of fragmented governance across different administrative lines, and provides top-level support for major cross-regional and cross-field protection projects. The second feature is its professional prominence: it proposes Chinese-characteristic solutions such as the integrated protection of linear heritage and cultural routes, and the effective protection and living inheritance of famous historical and cultural cities, districts, towns, and villages, and explicitly requires the implementation of pre-conditions for cultural relic protection such as "survey first, then construction" and "archaeology first, then land transfer" in urban and rural construction, thereby forging a protection path suited to the characteristics of China's cultural roots on the basis of drawing on international experience. The third feature is its clear guidance: key points and nodes are clear and implementable, with two rounds of evaluation and assessment set up, forming a complete working loop of "deployment, advancement, assessment, and accountability," providing a clear action guide for all localities and departments to advance related work.

At present and for some time to come, an important direction for tackling hard problems in China's cultural heritage protection is to make up for the prominent shortcomings in "protecting everything that ought to be protected" with respect to historical cities and historical districts through refined classified protection. After years of sustained efforts, China ranks first in the world in the number of world cultural heritage sites, has more than 140,000 cultural relic protection units at all levels, 146 national famous historical and cultural cities, more than 1,300 historical and cultural districts, and more than 1,500 representative items of national intangible cultural heritage; a protection system covering major categories has begun to take shape, with notable achievements. However, measured against the requirements of holistic and systematic protection, urban cultural heritage protection still suffers from the problems of "incomplete coverage and lagging recognition." The Plan's proposal to strengthen classified protection and to holistically and systematically protect ancient cities such as historical capitals, prefectural cities, prefecture-level cities, and county seats is a forceful response to this. At present, our protection efforts remain insufficient. For example, in one eastern province, of 105 historical prefectural and county seats, 75 still retain to varying degrees their ancient city layouts and historical features, yet only 8 have been included in the national list of famous historical and cultural cities. This directly means that in the process of urban renewal, the survival of a large number of historical districts not yet included in the protection list faces risks. The deeper problem lies in a cognitive bias in protection: many localities equate cultural heritage protection with the honorific work of "application and approval," treating protection as a "reward" to be sought from above rather than a statutory responsibility that must be fulfilled and a bottom line of cultural security that must be firmly held. The reason such a misunderstanding of "valuing application over survey, valuing listing over safeguarding" exists is the failure to elevate cultural heritage protection to the height of safeguarding national cultural security. Therefore, doing a good job of "protecting everything that ought to be protected" is one of the important tasks of the 15th Five-Year Plan period.

To make up for the shortcomings in "protecting everything that ought to be protected," a scientific and complete mechanism for implementing the Plan must be established. First, protection awareness must be raised, viewing territory-wide protection work from the height of national cultural security, and making clear that all spatial remains bearing the historical lineage of a city possess protection value. Second, identification standards must be refined, incorporating environmental elements reflecting the characteristics of different historical periods into the overall protection scope. Third, the tiered protection system must be improved to resolve the problems of vague protection standards and crude control measures. Finally, a full-coverage, dynamically updated protection list must be established, forming a standardized, statistically measurable, and controllable roster of objects, so that all historical remains are "documented for reference, governed by regulations, and protected by policy."

The Plan also has many highlights in its safeguard mechanisms. For example, for the first time at the level of central documents, the Plan explicitly proposes supporting the protection of cultural relics and historic sites through central special lottery public welfare funds, which has attracted industry-wide attention. Drawing on mature international experience, countries and regions such as the United Kingdom and the European Union, which started cultural heritage protection earlier, have long directed about 15 percent of lottery revenue to various cultural heritage protection projects. The introduction of this policy will, at the implementation level, promote the formation of a more diversified new pattern of resource input for China's cultural heritage protection.

Cultural heritage is the physical testimony to the more than 5,000 years of continuous development of Chinese civilization and is the non-renewable root of that civilization. The implementation of the Plan will push China's cultural heritage protection into a new stage of systematic protection and provide stronger support for building a socialist cultural power.

(Author's affiliation: Tsinghua University)

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Delicacies at the Confluence of River and Sea

By: 赵 飞

China is a major maritime country, with a large number of marine-type agricultural heritage resources. In October of this year, the eighth batch of China's Important Agricultural Heritage Systems was announced, and the Chenzhou oyster farming system in Shanwei, Guangdong, was prominently listed. This is the first project in the country with marine aquaculture as its core element, adding a footnote to the traditional wisdom of the Chinese people in "farming the sea and herding the ocean."

The oyster is an economic shellfish widely distributed from temperate to tropical seas, and "hao" (蚝) is its colloquial name in the South China region. Oysters are known as "milk of the sea," and the history of human consumption can be traced back to the Stone Age. According to a notice issued by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in 2017, a total of 44 countries worldwide farm oysters, with China being the largest producer, accounting for as much as 85% of global output.

Guangdong spans the tropical and subtropical zones, borders the South China Sea, and has long been a major marine fishery region in China. The artificial farming of oysters in the Pearl River Estuary area has a long history, with records dating back to the Song Dynasty. In the Qing Dynasty, Qu Dajun's "New Words of Guangdong," Volume 23, "Words on Shellfish · Oysters," records the biological morphology of oysters, the origin of their naming, the methods of oyster field cultivation, the distinction between "natural oysters" and "cultivated oysters," oyster-harvesting songs and tools, and oyster-shell houses, from which one can gain a superficial understanding (管窥, guan kui - "tube, peep") of the profound value of the oyster farming system along the Guangdong coast.

Chenzhou oysters belong to the species Crassostrea hongkongensis (Hong Kong giant oyster), and although they were formally named relatively late, they are a variety that has been farmed in the coastal areas of Guangdong since ancient times. Oyster seedlings are taken from natural sea areas, and their excellent traits are shaped by the environment rather than obtained through genetic selection and breeding. Oysters feed on plankton, and farming requires no artificial feeding, which undoubtedly puts the oyster farmers' management and utilization of river and sea water to a severe test.

Chenzhou's "ten-thousand-mu oyster fields" are composed of hundreds of "ponds" (tang) and "enclosures" (wen). Those of small area are called "oyster ponds," while those of more than one hundred mu are mostly called "oyster enclosures" or "fish enclosures." Oyster enclosures are sited in inner-bay areas near land where fresh water frequently flows in, on tidal flats above the low-tide line. Oyster farmers build dikes manually, dig ditches, and install sluice gates to store seawater, using the rise and fall of the tide to bring in or release oyster seedlings for farming. The water quality in the enclosures is regulated by the inflow of fresh water, making the water fertile and the specific gravity of the seawater appropriate, effectively avoiding the violent tidal changes and pollution impacts of natural sea areas. While stabilizing water quality, this also supplements natural bait. In response to different water environments, oyster farmers act in light of local conditions: in shallow seas with frequent tides and open waters, they use multiple methods such as cement pillars, floating platforms, and inserted bamboo; the enclosures and ponds serve as fattening areas for oysters, with shallower water and gentler currents, so inserted bamboo and hanging culture are mostly used. Oyster enclosures mostly also raise fish and shrimp (with seedlings coming from river and sea water), which both increases the organic matter in the water, providing bait for oyster farming, and improves overall farming returns. When the "drying of the enclosures" takes place after the winter oyster harvest, the water in the enclosure ditches can still support the growth of fish and shrimp.

Chenzhou Village was originally an isolated island at sea, and its residents have made a living from oysters for more than 300 years. To this day, the vast majority of villagers are still oyster farmers. In terms of farming skill, the former village party secretary Huang Zhiming is an outstanding person (佼佼者, jiao jiao zhe - "outstanding, person"). In his view, water quality, salinity, season, rainfall, wind, tides, and the structure of the tidal flats can all have a considerable impact on oyster growth. Huang Zhiming's pond is right next to that of a young oyster farmer, and although the area is the same size, his output can be two to three times greater. Farming the sea and herding the ocean likewise requires adapting to nature and utilizing nature. The Chenzhou oyster farming system, which requires no external inputs such as fertilizer or feed, operates entirely on the oyster farmers' scientific command of ecological conditions, and the preciousness of traditional techniques and knowledge is made even more apparent (益彰, yi zhang - "more, manifest") here.

(The author is a professor at South China Agricultural University)

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The Story of Xiyin Over a Century

By: 周飞亚

In late autumn October, the Fifth China Archaeology Congress opened in Yuncheng, Shanxi. Several hundred scholars gathered for this largest and highest-specification academic conference in China's archaeological community, and over three days of intense discussion, one word was unavoidable: Xiyin.

Exactly 100 years ago, it was on the gray-earth ridge of Xiyin Village in Xia County, Yuncheng, that the 30-year-old Li Ji struck the first shovel of scientific archaeology independently led by a Chinese, opening a new chapter in modern Chinese archaeology.

In those days, the Xiyin site was excavated over a very small area, yet it set four "firsts"—

The first use of the three-point recording method, the stratification method, and the trench-and-pit method, recording every excavated artifact with three-dimensional coordinates. This was the first excavation attempt in Chinese archaeology based on stratigraphy. The meticulous excavation and recording became the foundational standard for Chinese field archaeology. The Prehistoric Remains of Xiyin Village, published in 1927, became China's first archaeological excavation report, and its excavation site maps, plan and section drawings of excavation units and features, line drawings of unearthed artifacts, and pottery sherd statistical tables established the basic model for archaeological reports. In 1930, Liang Siyong wrote his master's thesis, The Neolithic Pottery from the Prehistoric Site of Xiyin Village in Shanxi, based on specimens from this excavation, applying typology for the first time to the systematic study of domestic archaeological materials. And before the excavation began, the Measures for the Management of Excavation of Historical Relics in Shanxi Province that Li Ji drafted with the Freer Gallery of Art in the United States, covering authority, ownership of excavated objects, and exhibition of relics, was also China's first management system for archaeological excavation.

It can be said that the scientification of Chinese archaeology began at Xiyin.

But to truly understand Xiyin, one must return to Yangshao. That was a nation's "question of culture."

In 1921, the Swedish scholar Johan Gunnar Andersson excavated Yangshao Village in Mianchi, Henan, and named the Yangshao culture, marking the birth of modern Chinese archaeology. However, Andersson put forward the "Western origin theory of Chinese culture," asserting that Chinese painted pottery originated in the West. At that time, with the nation in decline, this theory was prevalent, and many even doubted that Chinese civilization had "come from foreign lands." The aspiring scholars of the day all wanted to respond to this question. In March 1926, Li Ji, who had been appointed to the Tsinghua Research Institute of Chinese Studies, and the geologist Yuan Fuli conducted a survey of prehistoric human remains in the Fen River basin and discovered in Xiyin Village "a large place covered everywhere with prehistoric pottery sherds," leading to the first excavation of the Xiyin site.

The excavation yielded two precious finds. One was half a manually cut silkworm cocoon, which, though carbonized, had an extremely straight cut, pushing the history of Chinese sericulture and silk cultivation back to about 6,000 years ago. The other was painted pottery decorated with dot, arc, and triangle patterns, which Li Ji named the "Xiyin motif." These objects declared in physical form: Chinese civilization is rooted in its own land, having a long and continuous history (源远流长, yuan yuan liu chang - "source, far; flow, long"), and forms a system of its own.

In 1994, the Xiyin site saw its second excavation. This time, scholars clarified that the Xiyin site contains remains from multiple periods, including the Miaodigou Phase II culture and the Erligang culture, establishing the prehistoric cultural sequence of the region, and the Xiyin culture was formally named. From 2025 to 2026, led by the Shanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology, the third excavation of Xiyin began. This excavation ascertained the distribution range of the Xiyin site and identified the outline of a double ring-ditch from the Yangshao period, providing clear clues as to how the ancestors planned their settlement, divided functions, and organized defense. Multidisciplinary archaeology was carried out in full: plant remains such as foxtail millet and broomcorn millet obtained through flotation, and animal bones identified as pig, dog, deer, and other species, revealed a subsistence economy combining livestock raising with hunting and gathering; Raman spectroscopy confirmed that the painted pottery pigment was ochre; and in the residues of small-mouthed pointed-bottom bottles, red yeast mold and yeast were discovered, proving that ancestors more than 5,000 years ago had already mastered both qu-based fermentation and malt-based brewing techniques...

Xia County, where the Xiyin site is located, was called Anyi in ancient times and has historically been regarded as the capital of Yu the Great—the "Xia" in Xia County derives precisely from Xia culture. Legend holds that Leizu, the principal consort of the Yellow Emperor, taught the people to plant mulberry and raise silkworms in Xia County, and later generations built a Leizu temple on the gray-earth ridge, where a temple fair is held every year. The half silkworm cocoon unearthed at Xiyin in those years was long questioned, but in recent years, stone-carved or pottery cocoon chrysalises have been found at Xiyin Village and at multiple contemporary or slightly later sites in Hejin, Wenxi, Ruicheng, and elsewhere, providing important physical evidence that southern Shanxi was a core region for the origin of Chinese silk.

Why are there so many large Yangshao-period sites in the southern Shanxi region? Why did the ancestors choose to settle here and develop the splendid culture represented by the Xiyin culture? With the unfolding of the Project to Trace the Origins of Chinese Civilization, the answer has gradually become clear—salt and copper ore.

The Yuncheng salt lake is the largest producer of lake salt in the Central Plains region. The stable salt resources provided the necessary conditions for large-scale population aggregation and settlement, and were an important material foundation for the flourishing of prehistoric culture. The salt lake guaranteed the survival and wealth accumulation of early groups and induced social complexity; as civilization continued to evolve, the output of the Zhongtiao Mountains copper mines provided core strategic materials for the early Xia and Shang states, sustaining the operation of ritual civilization.

Xiyin, with the Zhongtiao Mountains to its east and located more than 20 kilometers north of the salt lake, is undoubtedly a striking coordinate in the study of southern Shanxi and the origins of Chinese civilization.

One site, three excavations, spanning a century. The three archaeological excavations of the Xiyin site happen to fall at three key junctures: the start of modern Chinese archaeology, the maturation of the disciplinary system, and the deepening of the search for the origins of civilization. The small village of Xiyin has thus become a mirror reflecting the century-long journey of Chinese archaeology. Today, a few kilometers from the site, the Xiyin Archaeology Museum, shaped like a silkworm cocoon, has also completed its exhibition installation and will soon open to the public. The story of a century of Xiyin and of Chinese archaeology continues to write new chapters.

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Distant Hu Melodies Enter the Han Sound

By: 李 博 王若洋

During the Sixteen Kingdoms and Northern Dynasties period, the Guanzhong region centered on Chang'an, relying on the natural defenses of the Xiao and Han passes, possessing the abundance of fertile plains, and controlling the eastern terminus of the Silk Road, became a place of competition and convergence. The Xiongnu, Di, Qiang, and Xianbei peoples successively established regimes here. While inheriting the ritual and musical traditions of the Central Plains, they also introduced the Western Regions' foreign music into the upper echelons of society and suburban ancestral sacrifices, forming a unique musical landscape of "incorporating foreign music into the elegant tradition, with foreign style and Han charm." However, records of the evolution of the music system during this period have always been brief. In recent years, the excavation of large numbers of musician figurines from tombs dating from the Sixteen Kingdoms to the Northern Dynasties in the Guanzhong region has provided precious material for reconstructing the ensemble compositions and instrument transformations of the time.

Among the tombs from the Sixteen Kingdoms to the Northern Dynasties period discovered in the Guanzhong region, several dozen have yielded musician figurines, concentrated in the Xianyang Plateau, Fengqi Plateau, Shaoling Plateau, and Gaoyang Plateau areas. The total number of various musician figurines exceeds 400, including performing musician figurines playing instruments, military procession figurines of the drum-and-brass band type, and posture figurines that hold no instruments but assume poses of singing, chanting, or clapping.

Tomb M63 of the early Former Qin period at Buli Village in Xianyang yielded a total of 31 musician figurines, among which the instruments held by the performing musician figurines fall into three categories: wind, plucked string, and percussion. The wind instruments include panpipes, sheng mouth organs, and flutes; the plucked string instruments include pipa lutes, se zithers, zheng zithers, and zhu zithers; and the percussion instruments are all drums. The posture figurines either narrate and sing, clap their hands, or lead the performance, together with the instrumentalists constituting a complete performance scene. Through this combination, it can be seen that in the musical culture of the Sixteen Kingdoms aristocratic class, the ritual instruments such as bells and chime stones commonly seen from the Shang and Zhou dynasties through the Western Han had completely withdrawn, replaced by a large number of silk-and-bamboo string and wind instruments, while Central Plains instruments such as the zheng and se zithers still occupied important positions. This configuration, with silk-and-bamboo string and wind music as the main body and ancient Chinese instruments as the backbone, continued the tradition of Han and Wei pure music. The Book of Sui: Treatise on Music states: "Pure music in its beginnings was the three modes of pure shang, and all were old tunes from the Han onward... this is the orthodox sound of China." From this it can be seen that aristocratic banquets in Guanzhong during the early and middle Sixteen Kingdoms period were not entirely foreign sounds, but were dominated by Central Plains pure shang music, which corresponds precisely with the documentary records that the rulers of the Former Qin and Later Qin emphasized Han institutions and cultivated ritual and music.

However, this lineage of orthodox Chinese sound did not echo for long in Guanzhong. From the late Later Qin period through the Northern Wei period, the situation underwent a change. In tombs such as Xi'an Caochangpo M1, the Liang Meng tomb at Hongqingyuan, and Dengjiazhong Village M3, the accompanying musician figurines are predominantly of the drum-and-brass band type.

Why did the drum-and-brass band replace the performing musicians? The root of the change perhaps still lies in regime changes and the displacements of war. In the late Later Qin period, when Liu Yu entered the pass, he collected the court musicians and performers and took them south across the Yangtze, and from this point the Han court music of Guanzhong suffered a severe blow to its vitality. After the Northern Wei established its capital at Pingcheng and subsequently took Guanzhong, although the remaining musicians were relocated north to Pingcheng, the Xianbei rulers "took pleasure in their native music and did not change their customs," and the military music of horns and drums gradually rose to a dominant position. The drum-and-brass band thus became the main theme of Northern Dynasties tombs, while complete sets of performing musician figurines nearly disappeared.

The musical culture of the Sixteen Kingdoms period in Guanzhong did not develop in isolation; regional exchange can be traced in the musician figurines. The horn-type instrument is one example. The foreign horn frequently appears in Northern Dynasties musician figurines from Guanzhong, becoming a common instrument in drum-and-brass processions. Yet in extant musical imagery from the Han and Wei periods, the horn is rarely seen. This contrast suggests that the horn was not an inherent member of Central Plains music and dance. The Song dynasty scholar Chen Yang recorded in his Book of Music that "the bronze horn is a musical instrument of Gaochang, shaped like an ox horn, two chi in length." Gaochang was situated at the strategic thoroughfare from the Hexi Corridor to the Western Regions, and maintained continuous military and demographic exchanges with Guanzhong. The horn may well have been introduced into Guanzhong along with the population movements triggered by the wars of the Sixteen Kingdoms period, and was widely used in military drum-and-brass music.

Happening by chance or coincidentally (无独有偶, wu du you ou - "no, unique, also, have, coincidence"), the gang drum, which like the horn belonged to the drum-and-brass system, also reveals the same information. The gang drum unearthed from Xi'an Dengjiazhong Village M3 is nearly identical in form and playing method to the gang drum depicted in the mural of Tomb M4 of the Wei and Jin period at Digengpo in Gaotai, Gansu, confirming the musical interaction between Guanzhong and the Hexi Corridor. The horn was responsible for blowing and sounding, while the gang drum governed beating time; the two, one blowing and one striking, can both trace their early forms to the Hexi and Western Regions area, which precisely provides an annotation for the phenomenon of the drum-and-brass band replacing the performing musicians.

Whether it was the horn of Gaochang or the vertical harp of Kucha, their eastward transmission was closely related to the event of Lü Guang's western expedition. The Taiping Imperial Reader records that "when Lü Guang destroyed Kucha, he obtained its music, and it is recorded that there was a vertical harp." The musician figurine playing the vertical harp unearthed from Tomb M2 at Pocun, Xianyang, is the only example found to date among Sixteen Kingdoms period musician figurines in the Guanzhong region, adding a key link to the path of eastward transmission of Western Regions instruments represented by the vertical harp.

Looking back on this course, the musical culture of the Sixteen Kingdoms and Northern Dynasties period in Guanzhong was not a one-way substitution of "Han music declining, foreign music rising," but rather an accumulation built up layer upon layer. The Central Plains music since the Han and Wei dynasties was not severed by the wars, and foreign instruments continued to pour into Guanzhong with population migration and Silk Road exchanges. Musical elements from different regions and ethnic groups collided over long periods and absorbed one another; new instruments and old traditions were reconfigured, presenting a brand-new appearance unique to that era. What the Guanzhong musician figurines present is precisely the absorption, transformation, and re-creation that occurred after different cultures met.

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Page editors: Zhou Feiya

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