CPC and World Political Parties Summit
Xi Jinping video conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202107/1227891.shtml
Chinese human rights development
Here are the highlights:
– The CPC upholds the rights to subsistence and development as the primary and basic human rights, and works hard to ensure and improve people’s wellbeing through development.
– The CPC has strived for people’s liberation and wellbeing.
– Since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the CPC has established systems that respect China’s actual conditions and ensure the people’s principal status as masters of the country.
– China has integrated its national human rights action plans with its national development plans.
– The principle of respecting and protecting human rights has been embedded in the governance of the CPC.
A total of 32.9 million senior citizens in China received advanced age subsidies, nursing subsidies, and other old-age subsidies in March 2021.
– China has put in place the world’s largest social security system, including pensions, medical and health care, and social assistance, expanding coverage and improving protection.
– The life expectancy of Chinese citizens rose to 77.3 years in 2019, compared with 35 years in 1949.
– China’s completion rate of the free nine-year compulsory education was 95.2 percent in 2020, making it reaching the average of high-income countries.
– China’s achievements in poverty reduction have written a new chapter in the history of human rights, and created a miracle in the global human rights effort.
– Satellite images show that from 2000 to 2017, China contributed a quarter of the world’s newly forested land, ranking first among all countries.
– China maintains that all ethnic groups are equal, and ensures that people of all ethnic groups have equal rights to administer state affairs in accordance with the law.
– China has been implementing policies on freedom of religious belief, building active and healthy religious relationships, and respecting and protecting citizens’ right to believe in or not to believe in any religion.
– Of China’s 55 ethnic minorities, 52 have their own spoken languages, with the exception of the Hui, who have used Han Chinese historically, and the Manchu and She peoples who now generally use Han Chinese.
– Students in Tibet autonomous region and south Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region enjoy free education for 15 years, part of China’s efforts to ensure ethnic minority groups’ right to education.
– The Communist Party of China (CPC) is committed to bringing peace and progress to the whole of humanity.
– The CPC applies the principle of universality of human rights to China’s national conditions, and has opened a new path of human rights protection, adding diversity to the concept of human rights.
– China has sent more than 40,000 military personnel to participate in about 30 UN peacekeeping missions in Sudan, Lebanon, Cambodia, Libya, and other countries and regions.
– China actively participates in international arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation, opposes arms races, and safeguards global strategic balance and stability.
– China is a contributor to international human rights standards.
– China has actively engaged in international human rights undertakings.
– China supports the reform of international human rights organizations in a fair, rational and inclusive direction.
– The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is an initiative for common development and also for protecting human rights.
– China has signed 26 international human rights instruments, including six core UN conventions.
– China had already provided or was offering anti-epidemic assistance to 151 countries and 14 international organizations.
To Blinken
2021年6月11日，中共中央政治局委员、中央外事工作委员会办公室主任杨洁篪应约同美国国务卿布林肯通电话时，就涉疆、涉港等问题表明中方严正立场。
杨洁篪指出，最近种种迹象表明，一些反华势力企图掀起一股又一股恶浪，借所谓涉疆、涉港问题对中国抹黑，他们不可能得逞。涉疆、涉港问题事关中国主权和领土完整，涉及中方核心利益。我们敦促美方尊重中方主权和领土完整，不得以任何借口干涉中国内政，不得以任何方式损害中方核心利益。
杨洁篪强调，涉疆问题不是什么人权、宗教问题。针对新疆暴恐事件一度呈上升趋势，中国政府坚决采取措施，维护公众安全，这理所应当。美方抛出关于新疆的种种谎言，企图破坏新疆安定团结局面，完全是颠倒黑白、极其荒谬，中方坚决反对。香港是中国的特别行政区，香港事务纯属中国内政。完善香港特别行政区选举制度，旨在维护中国宪法和香港基本法确定的香港特别行政区宪制秩序，确保以爱国者为主体的“港人治港”。对管治者的爱国立场和政治资格作出严格要求，是世界通例。鼓吹“港独”的人没有资格参与香港治理，并且必须受到香港国安法的惩治。
Anti-sanctions law – aimed at providing a legal basis to counter foreign sanctions – passed by China’s top legislative body, the National People’s Congress Standing Committee 6-10-21
Tibet Since 1951
China to offer $3b to developing countries for COVID-19 response
The Global Health Summit was a special event in Rome and organized by Italy, the G20 Presidency of 2021, and the European Commission.
Xi said China has already supplied 300 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to the world and will provide more, and China is fully implementing the G20 Debt Service Suspension Initiative for Poorest Countries and has so far put off debt repayments exceeding $1.3 billion, the highest deferral among G20 members.
China has provided $2 billion in assistance for the COVID-19 response and economic and social recovery in developing countries, and have sent medical supplies to more than 150 countries and 13 international organizations, providing more than 280 billion masks, 3.4 billion protective suits and 4 billion testing kits to the world.
China supports its vaccine companies in transferring technologies to other developing countries and carrying out joint production with them.
China will provide an additional $3 billion in international aid over the next three years to support COVID-19 response and economic and social recovery in other developing countries.
Xi calls out ‘hegemony’, insists on ‘justice’
4-20-21 Reiterating China’s position on strengthening multilateralism, President Xi Jinping on Tuesday said there is a “need for justice, not hegemony” and big countries should “behave in a manner befitting their status.”
Addressing the Boao Forum for Asia annual conference on its 20th anniversary, Xi urged solidarity and cooperation in the backdrop of the ravaging COVID-19 pandemic.
“Instability and uncertainty are clearly on the rise. Humanity is facing growing governance deficit, trust deficit, development deficit, and peace deficit,” he told the conference via video link.
However, he said economic globalization is “showing renewed resilience; and the call for upholding multilateralism and enhancing communication and coordination has grown stronger.”
“China calls on all countries in Asia and beyond to answer the call of our times, defeat the pandemic through solidarity, strengthen global governance, and keep pursuing a community with a shared future for mankind,” he added.
Xi said post-pandemic times require “consultation on an equal footing to create a future of shared benefits.”
China will, he added, continue to carry out anti-COVID cooperation with the World Health Organization and assured to make “vaccines a global public good.”
“Global governance should reflect the evolving political and economic landscape in the world, conform to the historical trend of peace, development and win-win cooperation, and meet the practical needs in addressing global challenges,” said the Chinese president.
“We need to follow the principles of extensive consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits, uphold true multilateralism, and make the global governance system more fair and equitable.”
No to unilateralism
Calling for support and safeguarding the UN-centered international system, Xi said the international order should be preserved while the multilateral trading system “should be upheld with the World Trade Organization at its core.”
“We must not let the rules set by one or a few countries be imposed on others, or allow unilateralism pursued by certain countries to set the pace for the whole world,” he added.
“We need commitment to justice to create a future of mutual respect and mutual learning. Diversity is what defines our world and makes human civilization fascinating,” he said.
Focusing on China’s multi-trillion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Xi said China “will follow the principles of extensive consultation, joint contribution, and shared benefits, and champion the philosophy of open, green, and clean cooperation, in a bid to make the BRI cooperation high-standard, people-centered and sustainable.”
He said China will build a closer partnership in health and said the country has already started joint vaccine production in BRI participating countries such as Indonesia, Brazil, the United Arab Emirates, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Turkey.
Besides, he said Beijing will build partnerships for connectivity, green development, and “openness and inclusiveness.”
“China will stay committed to peace, development, cooperation and mutual benefit, develop friendship and cooperation with other countries on the basis of the five principles of peaceful coexistence, and promote a new type of international relations,” he said.
World’s largest social security system
China has built the world’s largest social security system. By the end of 2020, the number of people covered by basic pension reached 999m and those by medical insurance and unemployment insurance reached 1.36bn and 217m.
Nuclear Power in China
Hong Kong gets much of its power from mainland China, in particular about 70% of the output from Daya Bay’s 1888 MWe net nuclear capacity is sent there. A 2014 agreement increases this to 80%. The Hong Kong government plans to close down its coal-fired plants, and by 2020 to get 50% of its power from mainland nuclear (now 23%), 40% from gas locally (now 22%) and 3% from renewables. Another option, with less import dependence, is to increase domestic generation from gas to 60%, and maintain mainland nuclear at 20%.
Hong Kong utility China Light & Power (CLP) has equity in CGN’s Daya Bay (25%) power plant, and was until 2013 negotiating a possible 17% share in Yangjiang. After considering equity in a further CGN nuclear plant, in October 2016 CLP Holdings Ltd successfully bid for a 17% share in Yangjiang Nuclear Power Co Ltd, in response to a CGN general invitation to tender.
Since 1994 Hong Kong has been getting up to one-third of its power from Daya Bay output, and this contract now runs to 2034. According to CLP data, nuclear power cost HK 47 c/kWh in November 2013, compared with 27 cents for coal and 68 cents for gas, which provides the main opportunity to increase supply. CLP supplies about 80% of Hong Kong’s power.