Page 7 - COMMUNIQUÉ OF THE FOURTH PLENARY SESSION OF THE 18TH CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF CHINA

participation, expert evaluation, risk assessment, legality review, and collective
discussion and decision making into the legal procedures for making major
administrative decisions; and establish a mechanism for administrative agencies to
review the legality of their major decisions, a lifelong accountability system for
major decisions, and a mechanism to hold people accountable retrospectively for
their decisions.

We must deepen structural reform in law enforcement by administrative
agencies and improve the mechanism for coordinating administrative enforcement
of law with the administration of criminal justice.

We must ensure that law is administered in a strict, standardized, impartial,
and civil manner; punish all types of illegal behavior in accordance with the law;
intensify law enforcement in key areas involving people’s immediate interests;
establish a sound system of administrative discretion standards; and fully
implement the accountability system for law enforcement by administrative
agencies.
We must strengthen limits on administrative powers and increase oversight of
the exercise of these powers, and improve remedial and accountability
mechanisms. We must build transparency into government work across the board,
uphold the principle of always remaining transparent other than in exceptional
cases, and ensure that decision making, implementation, management, services,
and outcomes are all open to the public.

It was stated at the session that justice is the lifeblood of the rule of law.
Judicial justice greatly encourages social justice, while judicial injustice cripples it.
We must improve the system for managing the judiciary and the mechanisms for
the exercise of judicial powers, standardize judicial behavior, tighten oversight of
judicial activities, and make every effort to ensure that the people feel justice is
served in every case that comes before the court.

We must improve the system for ensuring independent and impartial exercise
of judicial and procuratorial powers in accordance with the law; develop a system
of record keeping, reporting, and accountability to deal with intervention in
judicial activities by officials, especially in the handling of cases; and establish a
sound mechanism for protecting judicial officers in performing their legally
mandated duties.

We must improve the allocation of judicial functions and powers, carry out
pilot reforms in separating judicial from executive power, establish circuit courts
under the Supreme People’s Court, explore the establishment of people’s courts
and people’s procuratorates whose jurisdiction extends beyond administrative
divisions, and search for ways to build a system of procuratorates handling public
interest litigation.

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