The 12th National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, held the third plenum of its fifth session and reviewed reports presented by the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate on the morning of March 12 in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Members of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National Committee attended the meeting.

In the afternoon, the CPPCC National Committee held various group meetings to comment on the two reports.

Yang Kaisheng, CPPCC National Committee member and former President of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, said the two reports both went into detail. They show that since last year, both the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate have intensified their efforts to combat corruption, abuse of power and dereliction of duty. They have followed the principle of "leaving no corrupt official beyond the arm of the law."

"While clamping down on bribery according to law, we should punish not only the recipients, but also the bribers," Yang suggested.

The people's courts and procuratorates at all levels should pay more attention to increasing criminal punishments for bribers so as to improve the efficacy of bribery prevention, Yang said.

Xu Zuyuan, CPPCC National Committee member and former Vice Minister of Transport, approved of the report by the Supreme People's Court, which mentions its firm commitment to safeguarding China's maritime rights and interests.

According to the report delivered by Supreme People's Court Chief Justice and President Zhou Qiang, China will introduce comprehensive judicial interpretation on maritime governance over all waters under China's jurisdiction.

Xu said that along with China's economic activities and foreign trade growing, more Chinese enterprises and citizens are getting increasingly involved in maritime disputes with foreign entities.

"According to the report, 16,000 maritime cases were settled by Chinese courts last year. The large scale adversely impacted the development of our nation's maritime cause and showed Chinese companies, ship owners and crews have to cultivate a stronger level of legal awareness," Xu said.

Xu said due to ambiguous territorial jurisdiction, many ship-building cases were settled under foreign laws. In recent years, several domestic institutions such as Shanghai Maritime University and the courts have become increasingly aware of maritime laws and more cases are being tried in China.

Xu also suggested that judges be given more training to be enabled to try international maritime cases.

Li Yizhong, member of the Standing Committee of the 12th CPPCC National Committee, said, "The Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate have made great efforts and improvements in correcting mishandled cases."

"The reports should have mentioned that investigators who mishandled cases would be held accountable. If they violated the law, we would never hesitate to bring them to justice," Li said.

Staff from the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate attended the group discussions.

Copyedited by Sudeshna Sarkar

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