A senior Chinese military official on Saturday urged all-out efforts from the People's Liberation Army (PLA) to save lives in the quake-hit areas.

Armed forces must rescue people and save their property at all costs, said Xu Caihou, vice chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC) and member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, during a meeting on the disaster relief work of the army.

He urged army officers to make life-saving priority of their missions in the relief work in southwest China's Sichuan Province, which was hit by a strong earthquake on Monday.

He said President Hu Jintao's inspection to the earthquake-devastated areas would encourage the soldiers in the rescue missions.

The army should implement the instructions and orders of President Hu during his inspection tour, who is also general secretary of the CPC Central Committee and CMC chairman, said Chen Bingde, CMC member and chief of the General Staff.

Chen also stressed the importance of logistic support for the rescue missions.

(Xinhua News Agency May 18, 2008)