China will finish the planned construction of national highway system that comprises five north-south highway trunk roads and seven east-west trunk roads and build eight inter-provincial roads this year, communication minister Li Shenglin said on the weekend.

So far, the highway system, which has a total mileage of 35,000 km, has taken shape, Li said at a national communication work conference held in Beijing.

Meanwhile, China is to build new expressway roads with a total length of 5,000 km and expand construction of eight inter-provincial highways, he said.

More important, Li said, the country will start building a road to Medog, the last roadless county in southeastern part of Tibet, this year. The central government has been considering building the highway in Medog since 1975. However, the highway poses a number of engineering challenges as Medog sits on the Himalayan fault line where there are many earthquakes and landslides.

By the end of 2007, China had built roads with a total length of 116,000 km. The mileage of highway opening to traffic totals 3.57 million km, Li said.

Work has completed on 80 percent of the eight inter-provincial highway roads. Constructions on bridges over the Yangtze River, Hangzhou Bay and some other key rivers are in final touches.

(Xinhua News Agency January 6, 2008)