Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶) said that China "cannot" abolish the death penalty due to the country's "national conditions," but outlined hoped for regulations on how the state imposes capital punishment.
"China is reforming its judicial system, including taking the right to review the death penalty to the Supreme People's Court," Wen told journalists at the close of the National People's Congress. "However, given our national conditions we cannot abolish the death penalty."
Wen further said that as "half the countries in the world" implement the death penalty, China had no reason to abolish capital punishment.
"What we are doing is to institute an effective system in China to insure prudence and justice in issuing the death penalty," Wen said.
According to international human rights organizations like Amnesty International, China executes more people each year than the rest of the world combined.
Wen also said that maintaining healthy and sustained growth of the world's fastest growing major economy is an uphill battle against entrenched structural and institutional obstacles.
"In the past couple of years we have been facing a battle ... in terms of economic development," Wen said.
"The problems we face in China's economy can be boiled down to structural problems, the [type] of growth pattern and institutional problems.
"All these deep rooted and underlying problems need time to be addressed," he said of the ongoing efforts to transform the economy from a Marxist centrally-planned model to one which is market-oriented.
The government was actively trying to adjust growth to a speed capable of creating jobs but not so fast that ongoing imbalances would become unsustainable, he said.
"A slow economic growth rate won't do because it will make it more difficult for us to create jobs, increase revenues and engage in more undertakings for society," Wen said.
Wen also heaped praise on former Hong Kong chief executive Tung Chee-hwa (
"In the past seven years, Mr. Tung has done tremendous and pioneering work for the implementation of the principle of one country, two systems, the Basic Law and maintaining prosperity and stability in Hong Kong," Wen said.
"I believe history will treat him fairly for his efforts and contributions," he said.
Wen said the selection process for Tung's successor would be based on laws, but gave no details.
"After Tung's resignation, the election of the new chief executive will proceed in strict accordance with the Basic Law and other laws in Hong Kong," Wen said.
Wen also sounded an optimistic note on Hong Kong.
"Hong Kong people's way of life also stayed the same," Wen said, defending Beijing's formula for governing the territory.
The Taipei MRT is open all night tonight following New Year’s Eve festivities, and is offering free rides from nearby Green Line stations. Taipei’s 2025 New Year’s Eve celebrations kick off at Taipei City Hall Square tonight, with performances from the boy band Energy, the South Korean girl group Apink, and singers Gigi Leung (梁詠琪) and Faith Yang (楊乃文). Taipei 101’s annual New Year’s firework display follows at midnight, themed around Taiwan’s Premier12 baseball championship. Estimates say there will be about 200,000 people in attendance, which is more than usual as this year’s celebrations overlap with A-mei’s (張惠妹) concert at Taipei Dome. There are
LOOKING FOR WHEELS: The military is seeking 8x8 single-chassis vehicles to test the new missile and potentially replace the nation’s existing launch vehicles, the source said Taiwan is developing a hypersonic missile based on the Ching Tien (擎天) supersonic cruise missile, and a Czech-made truck has been tentatively selected as its launch vehicle, a source said yesterday. The Ching Tien, formerly known as Yun Feng (雲峰, “Cloud Peak”), is a domestically developed missile with a range of 1,200km to 2,000km being deployed in casemate-type positions as of last month, an official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. The hypersonic missile to be derived from the Ching Tien would feature improved range and a mobile launch platform, while the latter would most likely be a 12x12 single chassis
UP AND DOWN: The route would include a 16.4km underground section from Zuoying to Fongshan and a 9.5km elevated part from Fongshan to Pingtung Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday confirmed a project to extend the high-speed rail (HSR) to Pingtung County through Kaohsiung. Cho made the announcement at a ceremony commemorating the completion of a dome at Kaohsiung Main Station. The Ministry of Transportation and Communications approved the HSR expansion in 2019 using a route that branches off a line from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung’s Zuoying District (左營). The project was ultimately delayed due to a lack of support for the route. The Zuoying route would have trains stop at the Zuoying Station and return to a junction before traveling southward to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝).
Parts of the nation, including in the south, could experience temperatures as low as 7°C early tomorrow morning, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. A strong continental cold air mass coupled with the effect of radiative cooling would bring cold weather to several northern cities and counties, and could even affect areas as far south as Tainan early tomorrow, the CWA said. Keelung, Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan, and Hsinchu, Miaoli and Yilan counties would experience temperatures below 10°C until this evening, according to cold surge advisories issued by the weather agency. The weather across the nation is forecast to remain