As the world marked International Human Rights Day on Monday, a
Chinese expert in the field has documented his country's work in
the area through a new article chronicling achievements that have
been made over the past five years.
Dong Yunhu, vice president of the China Society for Human Rights
Studies, the largest nongovernmental organization in the human
rights field in China, listed in his article some major facts
outlining the fruits that have been reaped.
In the newly-amended constitution of the Communist Party of
China (CPC) adopted at October's 17th Party Congress, one of the landmark
changes was that in the paragraph of "promoting socialist
democracy", it said the Party "respects and safeguards human
rights".
It was the first time the CPC considered the development of
human rights as an important aspect of national development.
In November 1991, the Information Office under the State Council
published its first-ever white paper entitled "Human Rights in
China", stressing that full access of human rights was socialist
China's "sublime goal".
In March 2004, parliament adopted an amendment to the
constitution that inserted the clause declaring "the state respects
and safeguards human rights", putting human rights protection under
the legal umbrella of the state.
In March 2006, China for the first time wrote "human rights
protection" in the country's national economic and social
development plan as a part of the modernization drive.
In his article Dong wrote: "Over the past five years, the most
prominent progress in China's human rights protection is the
'mainstreamlization' and entry of human rights into the country's
political life."
The public's right to know and right to supervise have been
constantly expanded. How state organs operate and how
legislators work become increasingly transparent, Dong said.
He pointed out that as a developing country with 1.3 billion
population, China was still confined by historic, economic and
social conditions. It had met many obstacles in the development of
human rights.
"The economic, social and legal systems in China are far from
mature and unbalanced development occurs between the rural and
urban areas and among different regions," Dong said. He noted that
"thorny issues in such aspects as employment, social security,
income distribution, education, medicine, housing and safe
production, had all effected public interests.
However, he was confident that "human rights conditions in China
would gradually improve along with the modernization process" as
long as the country "unswervingly implements human rights
protection principles and actively promotes democratic and legal
construction".
(Xinhua News Agency, December 11, 2007)