4. Accelerate the establishment of a social security system covering both urban and rural residents and guarantee their basic living conditions. Social security is an important guarantee of social stability. We will step up the building of a sound social security system that is based on social insurance, assistance and welfare, with basic old-age pension, basic medical care and subsistence allowances as its backbone, and supplemented by charity and commercial insurance. We will promote reform of basic old-age insurance systems in enterprises, Party and government organs and public institutions and explore ways to set up an old-age insurance system in rural areas. We will promote the development of basic medical insurance systems for urban workers and residents and a new type of cooperative medical care system in rural areas. We will improve the system of subsistence allowances for both urban and rural residents and gradually increase such allowances. We will improve the systems of unemployment, workers' compensation and maternity insurances. We will upgrade management of social security funds to higher-level authorities and work out unified methods for transferring social security accounts nationwide. We will provide more social security funds through various means and strengthen their oversight and management to maintain and increase their value. We will improve social assistance. We will do a good job providing special assistance to families of martyrs and servicemen and helping demobilized military personnel return to civilian life. We will promote programs for the disabled in a humanitarian spirit. We will develop more programs for the elderly. We will intensify our efforts in disaster prevention and reduction. We will improve the low-rent housing system and speed up resolution of the housing difficulties of low-income families in urban areas.

5. Establish a basic medical and health care system and improve the health of the whole nation. Health provides the foundation for people's all-round development and has a direct bearing on the happiness of each family. We must maintain the public welfare nature of public medical and health care services, always put disease prevention first, center on rural areas and attach equal importance to traditional Chinese medicine and Western medicine. We will separate government administration from medical institutions, management from operation, medical care from pharmaceuticals, and for-profit from nonprofit operations. We will increase government responsibilities and spending, improve the national health policy, and encourage greater participation of nongovernmental sectors so as to develop systems of public health services, medical services, medical security and medicine supply to provide both urban and rural residents with safe, effective, convenient and affordable medical and health services. We will improve the system to prevent and control the outbreak of major diseases and enhance our capacity to respond to public health emergencies. We will improve the three-tier rural health care network spanning the county, township and village and the urban community-based health care system, and deepen reform of public hospitals. We will set up a national system for basic pharmaceuticals to ensure their supply. We will support the development of traditional Chinese medicine and the folk medicines of ethnic minorities. We will work harder to improve the professional ethics and style of work of health workers and the quality of medical services. We must ensure food and drug safety. We will adhere to the basic state policy of family planning, keep the birthrate low and make the newborns healthier. We will launch patriotic sanitation campaigns and develop health care programs for women and children.

6. Improve social management and safeguard social stability and unity. Social stability is the common aspiration of the people and an important prerequisite for reform and development. We need to improve the structure of social management comprising Party committee leadership, government responsibility, nongovernmental support and public participation, and improve the system of social management at the primary level. We will stimulate the creativity of society to the greatest extent, maximize factors conducive to harmony and minimize those detrimental to it. We will properly handle contradictions among the people, improve the system for handling complaints in the form of letters and visits from the public, and strengthen the mechanism for safeguarding the rights and interests of the people in which the Party and the government play the leading role. We will attach importance to the development and management of social organizations. We will improve services for and management of the floating population. We must ensure safe development by strengthening management and oversight of work safety and taking effective measures to prevent serious or exceptionally serious accidents. We will improve the mechanism of emergency management. We will improve the crime prevention and control system, maintain law and order through comprehensive measures, launch intensive campaigns to ensure public security, reform and step up community policing in both urban and rural areas, and prevent and crack down on crime in accordance with the law to protect people's lives and property. We will improve the strategy and mechanism for national security, and keep high vigilance against and resolutely forestall separatist, infiltrative and subversive activities in various forms to safeguard national security.

It requires joint efforts of the whole society to build a harmonious society. We must therefore rely firmly on the people and mobilize all positive factors to create a lively situation in which everyone is duty-bound to work for and benefits from social harmony.

IX. Opening Up New Prospects for Modernization of National Defense and the Armed Forces

To strengthen national defense and the armed forces occupies an important place in the overall arrangements for the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Bearing in mind the overall strategic interests of national security and development, we must take both economic and national defense development into consideration and make our country prosperous and our armed forces powerful while building a moderately prosperous society in all respects.

For the armed forces to fully carry out the historical missions assigned by the Party and the people at this new stage in the new century, we must always follow the guidance of Mao Zedong's military thinking, Deng Xiaoping's thinking on building the armed forces in the new period and Jiang Zemin's thinking on building national defense and the armed forces, and take the Scientific Outlook on Development as an important guiding principle for strengthening national defense and the armed forces. We must implement the military strategy for the new period, accelerate the revolution in military affairs with Chinese characteristics, ensure military preparedness, and enhance the military's capability to respond to various security threats and accomplish diverse military tasks. We are determined to safeguard China's sovereignty, security and territorial integrity and help maintain world peace.

To make the armed forces more revolutionary, modernized and standardized is an integrated endeavor, and balanced progress must be made in all the three aspects. We must always adhere to the fundamental principle of the Party exercising absolute leadership over the armed forces and the fundamental purpose of the armed forces serving the people. We will educate the military in its historical missions, ideals, beliefs, combat-ready spirit and the socialist maxims of honor and disgrace, and ensure that it carries forward its fine traditions of following the Party's orders, serving the people and fighting valiantly and skillfully. We must build strong armed forces through science and technology. To attain the strategic objective of building computerized armed forces and winning IT-based warfare, we will accelerate composite development of mechanization and computerization, carry out military training under IT-based conditions, modernize every aspect of logistics, intensify our efforts to train a new type of high-caliber military personnel in large numbers and change the mode of generating combat capabilities. We must run the armed forces in accordance with the law, enforce strict discipline, improve relevant laws and regulations and strengthen scientific management.

In keeping with the new trends in world military affairs and the new requirements of China's development, we must promote innovation in military theory, technology, organization and management. We will adjust and reform the structure, staffing, policies and institutions of the armed forces to gradually develop a complete set of scientific modes of organization, institutions and ways of operation with Chinese characteristics and in conformity with the laws governing the development of modern armed forces. We will adjust and reform the systems of defense-related science, technology and industry and of weapons and equipment procurement, and enhance our capacity for independent innovation in R&D of weapons and equipment with better quality and cost-effectiveness. We will establish sound systems of weapons and equipment research and manufacturing, military personnel training and logistics that integrate military with civilian purposes and combine military efforts with civilian support, build the armed forces through diligence and thrift, and blaze a path of development with Chinese characteristics featuring military and civilian integration. We will enrich and develop military sciences by carefully studying the features and laws of building and running the armed forces and the strategies and tactics for people's war under the new historical conditions.

We will raise the people's awareness of national defense, strengthen national defense mobilization by improving the mobilization system, and enhance the quality of the reserves and the militia. We will strengthen the People's Armed Police so that it can better fulfill its duties of safeguarding national security and social stability and ensuring that the people live and work in peace. We must ensure that the government and the people support the military and give preferential treatment to the families of servicemen and martyrs, and that the military supports the government and cherishes the people. We will energetically encourage the military and the people to work together to promote cultural and ethical progress, and consolidate the solidarity between the military and the government and between the military and the people. Party organizations and governments at all levels and the general public will, as always, support efforts to strengthen national defense and the armed forces, and the military will continue to contribute to economic and social development.

X. Carrying Forward the Practice of "One Country, Two Systems" and Advancing the Great Cause of Peaceful National Reunification

Since the return of Hong Kong and Macao to the motherland, more and more experience has been gained in putting into practice the principle of "one country, two systems." The principle is perfectly correct and full of vigor. To realize China's peaceful reunification on this principle accords with the fundamental interests of the Chinese nation.

A major task the Party faces in running the country in the new circumstances is to ensure long-term prosperity and stability in Hong Kong and Macao. We will unswervingly implement the principle of "one country, two systems," under which Hong Kong people administer Hong Kong and Macao people administer Macao with a high degree of autonomy, and act in strict accordance with the basic laws of the two special administrative regions. We will render full support to the governments of the two regions in their administration in accordance with the law and in their efforts to promote economic growth, improve people's lives and advance democracy. We encourage people from all walks of life in Hong Kong and Macao to work with one accord to promote social amity under the banner of love for the motherland and devotion to their respective regions. We will increase exchanges and cooperation between the mainland and the two regions so that they can draw on each other's strengths and develop side by side. We will actively support the two regions in their external exchanges and firmly oppose attempts by any external force to interfere in their affairs. Our compatriots in Hong Kong and Macao, without doubt, have the wisdom and ability to successfully administer and develop their regions. Both regions have played and will continue to play an important role in China's modernization drive, and the great motherland will always provide them with strong backing for their prosperity and stability.

To resolve the Taiwan question and achieve complete national reunification is a common aspiration of all sons and daughters of the Chinese nation. We will uphold the principle of "peaceful reunification and one country, two systems" and the eight-point proposal for developing the relations between the two sides of the Taiwan Straits and advancing the process of peaceful national reunification in the present stage. We will never waver in our commitment to the one-China principle, never abandon our efforts to achieve peaceful reunification, never change the policy of placing our hopes on the people in Taiwan and never compromise in our opposition to the secessionist activities aimed at "Taiwan independence." With a firm grasp of the theme of peaceful development of cross-Straits relations, we will sincerely work for the well-being of our compatriots on both sides of the Straits and for peace in the Taiwan Straits region, and safeguard China's sovereignty and territorial integrity and the fundamental interests of the Chinese nation.

Upholding the one-China principle constitutes the political basis for peaceful development of cross-Straits relations. Although the mainland and Taiwan are yet to be reunified, the fact that they belong to one and the same China has never changed. China is the common homeland for the compatriots on both sides of the Straits, who have every reason to join hands to safeguard and develop this homeland. We are ready to conduct exchanges, dialogue, consultations and negotiations with any political party in Taiwan on any issue as long as it recognizes that both sides of the Straits belong to one and the same China. Here we would like to make a solemn appeal: On the basis of the one-China principle, let us discuss a formal end to the state of hostility between the two sides, reach a peace agreement, construct a framework for peaceful development of cross-Straits relations, and thus usher in a new phase of peaceful development.

The 1.3 billion people on the mainland and the 23 million people in Taiwan are of the same blood and share a common destiny. We will make every effort to achieve anything that serves the interests of our Taiwan compatriots, contributes to the maintenance of peace in the Taiwan Straits region, and facilitates peaceful national reunification. We understand, trust and care about our compatriots in Taiwan, and we will, therefore, continue to implement and enrich the policies and measures that benefit them, protect their legitimate rights and interests in accordance with the law, and support economic development on the west shore of the Straits in Fujian Province and in other areas where Taiwan investment is concentrated. The compatriots on both sides of the Straits need to increase contacts, strengthen economic and cultural exchanges in more areas and at higher levels and push for the resumption of direct links of mail, transport and trade, so that they will develop greater empathy and closer cooperation and work together for the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.

At present, the forces for "Taiwan independence" are stepping up their secessionist activities, seriously jeopardizing the peaceful development of cross-Straits relations. The compatriots on both sides need to work together to oppose and contain such activities. China's sovereignty and territorial integrity brook no division, and any matter in this regard must be decided by the entire Chinese people including our Taiwan compatriots. We are willing to make every effort with the utmost sincerity to achieve peaceful reunification of the two sides, and will never allow anyone to separate Taiwan from the motherland in any name or by any means.

The two sides of the Straits are bound to be reunified in the course of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. With close solidarity and concerted efforts of all Chinese people at home and overseas, the complete reunification of the motherland will surely be achieved.

XI. Unswervingly Following the Path of Peaceful Development

The world today is undergoing tremendous changes and adjustments. Peace and development remain the main themes of the present era, and pursuit of peace, development and cooperation has become an irresistible trend of the times. The progress toward a multipolar world is irreversible, economic globalization is developing in depth, and the scientific and technological revolution is gathering momentum. Global and regional cooperation is in full swing, and countries are increasingly interdependent. The international balance of power is changing in favor of the maintenance of world peace, and the overall international situation is stable.