LIFE IN PEACE: Eunice Moe Brock, a U.S. national who got a Chinese green card in 2009, celebrates the Chinese Lunar New Year with her interpreter in her home in Ji'nan, east China's Shandong Province, on February 15, 2010 (ZHU ZHENG)

China is rolling out the red carpet for permanent foreign residents, who will now in principle enjoy the same rights and shoulder the same obligations as Chinese citizens except for political rights or other special rights and obligations stipulated by law, according to a government regulation released on December 11, 2012.

The regulation specifies permanent residents' equal rights to employment, insurance, investment, home purchase, driver's licenses and education for their children.

Holders of a permanent residence permit, commonly known as a Chinese green card, can not only enjoy health and old-age insurance available to Chinese citizens but also acquire professional qualifications previously reserved for Chinese nationals, the regulation says.

"The new regulation will help give foreigners a sense of security," said Liu Guofu, an immigration law specialist at the Beijing Institute of Technology. He said that if residency does not bring other basic rights such as employment, pension and children's education, it will not attract foreign professionals.

Immigration integration

Rhio Zablam, a 34-year-old Filipino, is looking forward to getting his Chinese green card. He married a Chinese woman in 2011, and will be eligible to apply for permanent residency in three years.

Zablam said that the new green card policy is great for him, because he will not have to obtain a new work permit whenever he changes his job.

The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, adopted the country's first legislation covering the exit and entry of Chinese citizens and foreigners, the Law on the Exit and Entry Administration, in June 2012. According to the law, foreigners may not be employed in China without valid employment certificates. The law will take effect in July.

China first introduced the permanent residence status for foreigners in the Law on the Control of the Entry and Exit of Aliens that was adopted by the NPC Standing Committee in November 1985.

In 1986, Werner Gerich, a German who served as manager of the Wuhan Diesel Engine Plant in Hubei Province, became the first foreigner to be granted permanent residence status in China. From 1985 to 2004, the Chinese Government gave more than 3,000 foreigners this status.

China began issuing green cards in 2004. According to the Regulations on Examination and Approval of Permanent Residency for Foreigners promulgated by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that year, permanent residency is mainly open to foreign investors who have made sizable investment in China, high-level business executives, prestigious scholars and other persons who have made outstanding contributions or are of special importance to China, as well as people who come to China to join their family.

The 29-article regulations also spell out provisions on the prerequisites and procedures to apply for permanent residence permits.

Statistics from the Ministry of Public Security show that from 2004 to the end of 2011, 4,752 foreigners obtained Chinese green cards, of whom more than 90 percent were overseas Chinese, and 1,735 were highly talented people and their family members.

In 2009, Eunice Moe Brock, who came to China from the United States in 1999, was granted a Chinese green card. Brock was born in north China's Hebei Province in 1917, and returned to the United States 12 years later. In 1999, two years after her husband passed away, she sold her property and moved back to China. She then settled down in east China's Shandong Province, where she volunteered as an English teacher and donated funds to local primary schools, hospitals and villages.