Experts Tuesday lauded the newly released internal supervision regulation of the Communist Party of China, calling it a major step forward in institutionalized anti-corruption efforts.

Cheng Wenhao, director of the Anti-Corruption Research Center of Tsinghua University, hailed the regulation as a milestone in the party's 83-year history.

This is the party's first systematic set of rules for internal supervision since it was founded in 1921.

The full text of the regulation, which was promulgated by the party's Central Committee, was released to the public Tuesday. Another regulation on disciplinary penalties will come out today, party officials said.

Cheng said the regulation, when strictly enforced, will be an effective tool to check corruption at the source.

The regulation emphasizes advancing democracy and strengthening supervision within the party, while safeguarding party unity and advancement. It stresses the supervision of leading officials in checking corruption.

Cheng said the regulation will help curb abuse of power by leading officials as they make important decisions, especially those involving the distribution of huge amounts of public resources that can lead to grave losses to the country.

"The new regulation reinforces supervision by moving forward to the decision-making stage,'' he explained.

Fang Ning, deputy director of the Institute of Political Science of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said the regulation fairly summarizes the party's experience in fighting corruption in the past.

Party leaders, including Hu Jintao, general secretary of the Central Committee, have repeatedly sworn they would do all they can to weed out corruption without mercy.

Over the past year, 13 officials at provincial and ministerial levels have been disciplined for corruption. Wang Huaizhong, former vice governor of eastern China's Anhui Province, was executed last week in Jinan, the capital of Shandong Province.

Wang was sentenced to death in December for taking bribes valued at 5.2 million yuan (US$623,000) from 1994 to 2001 and possessing 4.8 million yuan (US$580,000) from unidentified sources. He lost the appeal of his case last month.

Wang was the third corrupt official at the provincial or ministerial level to be sentenced to death since 1978. The others were Hu Changqing, former vice-governor of east China's Jiangxi Province, and Cheng Kejie, former chairman of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, in the southern part of the nation.

China also signed the UN Anti-Corruption Convention at the end of last year, indicating its determination to solve corruption problems through more comprehensive cooperation with the world.

"Fighting corruption is a gradual process and the regulation offers clearer guidance and makes future initiatives more practical,'' Fang said, while noting that the crux of the problem is still linked with the quality of officials and improved public awareness.

The Central Committee has issued a notice urging members at all levels to implement the regulations strictly.

An annual survey conducted by the Research Department of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Central Committee showed that more than half of respondents were satisfied with the party's efforts to fight corruption last year.

The survey polled 12,000 respondents in 10 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions, including Beijing. About 60 percent said the government has already stepped up measures against corruption.

(China Daily February 18, 2004)