Premier: China’s financial system “sound and safe”

Xinhua article

NANNING, Oct. 5 (Xinhua) — Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said here Sunday that China’s financial institutions have generally increased their strength, profitability and risk-resisting ability, and the financial system as a whole is sound and safe in face of the international financial crisis.

Wen made the remarks during an inspection tour to Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in southwest China.

He said that the world economic situation has had dramatic changes this year, the United States’ subprime crisis has been deteriorating and is having an increasingly serious negative impact on the world’s financial market and the world economy as a whole.

Under multiple negative factors, both international and domestic, China has reacted actively and properly, made efforts to improve the predictability, pertinence and flexibility of macro-economic control policies, and timely solved outstanding problems in economic development. As a result, the country’s economy has maintained its momentum of smooth and rapid development, Wen said.

Generally speaking, China’s economic foundations have not changed and the economy is developing towards the preset macro control targets, said the Premier.

“We have full confidence in China’s economic development and financial stability,” Wen said, stressing that the most important thing is to do our own business well, maintain the stability of the economy and the financial and capital markets.

“It is the biggest contribution to the world when a big country with a population of 1.3 billion is able to maintain a lasting, smooth and fast economic development,” he said.

On Saturday and Sunday, Wen inspected villages and factories in the cities of Beihai, Qinzhou and Fangchenggang, and talked with local people of different nationalities and from all walks of life.

He said that the development of Beibu Gulf should focus on technological innovation and environmental protection to build into an important zone for international and regional economic cooperation.

In Gaosha Village of Qinzhou, Wen inspected rice paddy and visited farmers’ homes. He said that the government will further reinforce its support for agriculture, continue to increase subsidies to farmers and raise the minimum grain purchasing prices to mobilize farmers to produce more grain.

Resolution passed at the National Day meeting

This meeting, organised by Hands off China and the Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist-Leninist), in celebration of the 59th founding anniversary of the People’s Republic of China conveys its warm fraternal greetings to the Communist Party of China, the government of the People’s Republic of China and the Chinese people.

We take this opportunity to renew our heartfelt congratulations on the huge success of the Beijing Olympics and Paralympics as well as the Shenzhou-7 mission, in particular the space walk. Through these epic events, the people of the whole world have been able to see the enormous progress and tremendous achievements of socialist China, which stand in stark and growing contrast to the crisis, chaos and despondency now gripping the capitalist world.

We reaffirm our invariable solidarity with the Chinese party, government and people in their struggle to build a powerful, modernised and prosperous socialist nation, to reunify the country and to contribute to the building of an independent and peaceful world against imperialist aggression and war.

Long live Marxism-Leninism and proletarian internationalism!

Long live the People’s Republic of China!

Forward to the 60th anniversary!

Meeting report in Xinhua

Congrats to all on a fantastic meeting! Full report to follow; in the meantime, here’s what the comrades from Xinhua thought:

Xinhua article

Britain’s Communist Party celebrates 59th anniversary of New China

LONDON, Oct. 4 (Xinhua) — The Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist-Leninist) celebrated on Saturday evening the 59th anniversary of the founding of the New China, lending its unswerving support to China’s pursuit of socialism.

Reviewing China’s development since 1949, when the People’s Republic of China was founded, Harpal Brar, chair of the party, hailed China’s evolving in the past decades into a “thriving economy.”

“China has come a long way since it had been the miserable place under imperialist control. When 13 million children in Africa under the age of 15 die every year, over 400 million Chinese people have been lifted out of poverty in the last 30 years… China has achieved the basic human rights. It’s a living example of socialism,” he said.

Although the Chinese people know they still have a long way to go, “so far it has been fantastic,” he added.

According to Brar, China has long been supporting countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America in their struggle for independence and development.

The Chinese revolution has inspired the world with great lessons, therefore, celebrating China’s National Day, which falls on Oct. 1, is actually “paying back a little to China for what it does for us,” he said.

Some 80 party members and representatives from the Indian Workers’ Association, Communist Workers & Peasants Party of Pakistan attended the celebration.

Jack Shapiro, a veteran member of the Society for Anglo-China Understanding who had facilitated exchanges between Britain and China on rehabilitation for the disabled, and Kojo Gottfried, former Ghanaian Ambassador to China, also shared their memories of China experience.

A resolution passed at the meeting congratulated China on the success of the Beijing Olympics and Paralympics as well as the Shenzhou-7 manned space mission, in particular China’s first ever spacewalk.

“Through these epic events, the people of the whole world have been able to see the enormous progress and tremendous achievements of socialist China, which stand in stark and growing contrast to the crisis, chaos and despondency now gripping the capitalist world,” said the resolution.

The party also reaffirms its “invariable solidarity with the Communist Party of China and the Chinese government and people in their struggle to build a powerful, modernized and prosperous socialist nation, to reunify the country and to contribute to the building of an independent and peaceful world against imperialist aggression and war.”

In July this year, the Communist Party of Great Britain launched a “Hands off China” campaign, supporting China in the waves of China-bashing in western media in the run up to the Beijing Olympics.

Happy Birthday to the People’s Republic of China!

Xinhua article

BEIJING, Oct. 1 (Xinhua) — The 59th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, which fell on Wednesday, was celebrated by people from different walks of life across the country.

At Tian’anmen Square, the heart of the capital, a record 190,000 people from around the country gathered in the pre-dawn hours to observe a special national flag-raising ceremony.

Most of those who swarmed to the square beginning at midnight were college freshmen who wanted the best vantage point. They sat in groups, playing poker or electronic games while waiting for the red flag with five stars to be raised at 6:10 a.m.

The flag rose to the sound of the national anthem. As it reached the top, 10,000 pigeons signaling good wishes were released into the air from both sides of the Golden Bridge in front of Tian’anmen Gate.

“Happy birthday to China,” yelled students from the Beijing Science, Technology and Management College, a vocational school. One said: “Seeing the red flag rise to the tune of the heart-stirring national anthem, we felt happy, excited and proud.”

“Tears started to trickle down my face when I heard the anthem,” said Wang Hai, a migrant worker from the earthquake-hit Sichuan Province.

“When my home town was struck by a powerful quake in May, people from other parts of the country stood by us and aid poured in,” said Wang, who now works in Beijing. “I am proud of China.”

Chang Aoxue, from a rural part of north China’s Shanxi Province, was there with her 2-year-old daughter.

“I came here together with my girl to show my gratitude to the Party for encouraging the implementation of a policy saying getting rich is glorious, and good wishes to the motherland,” said Chang.

The celebration peaked when Party and government leaders, led by Hu Jintao, General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and also Chinese president, laid floral baskets before the Monument to People’s Heroes.

Students from Weishan Middle School in Tianjin, a mega-city near Beijing, on Wednesday chose to visit a photo exhibition, Five-Star Flag Flutters in the Wind, at Tianjin Museum.

Down south, more than 800 people in east China’s Jiangsu Province attended a ceremony held inside the Yuhuatai Cemetery forthe martyrs in Nanjing, provincial capital of Jiangsu, at 8 a.m.

Among the participants were officials from the Jiangsu government and Nanjing city officials, students, military officersand soldiers, as well as representatives of ordinary residents.

Apart from placing wreaths at the Monument, participants also observed a minute of silence and encircled the monument, with The Internationale playing.

In Shangyuan Village, Sichuan, Wang Qingyu celebrated National Day with friends and relatives in her new home.

Wang’s original house was seriously damaged in the 8.0 magnitude quake in May. With a government subsidy of 19,000 yuan (2,766 U.S. dollars) and her savings, Wang’s new 100-square-meter house was completed at the end of last month.

“With the concerted efforts of all my family, our life will be better and better,” she said. Her husband will work in a city to earn money.

The week-long holiday is also expected to help revive the tourism industry in Sichuan.

On Wednesday, the Jiuzhaigou scenic area greeted 8,500 tourists,said Feng Gang, a scenic area staff member. Although the number was only half the same period last year, it was a huge jump compared with the beginning of the post-quake period when it was 1,000 to 2,000, according to Feng.

The National Day golden week would bring the first peak of tourist arrivals to Sichuan, said Sichuan Tourism Bureau director Zhang Gu.

In Guangzhou, a key city in south China, more than 1,000 people attended a memorial service staged in the Guangzhou Uprising Martyr Cemetery Park on Wednesday.

Led by Wang Yang, Secretary of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the CPC, and Huang Huahua, Governor of Guangdong, the participants attended a flag-raising ceremony. Wang and Huang alsolaid floral baskets in front of the Monument for Martyrs in the Guangzhou Uprising.

To the southwest, the commemorative ceremony in Lhasa, the capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region, began at 10 a.m. at the square near the Potala Palace, an icon of the city.

Some 5,000 people attended Wednesday’s flag-raising activity. Among them, Nyima Cering, a resident of the Xueju neighborhood in Lhasa, is a regular visitor to the annual event.

“Following the Lhasa unrest in March, life meant more to me and I also understand a happy and stable life comes above all,” said the middle-aged Tibetan man.

The public, led by CPC and government authorities, paid tribute to revolutionary martyrs by laying floral baskets before the monument built in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the peaceful liberation of Tibet.