China's top judge and president of the Supreme People's Court Xiao Yang is to deliver a report on the work of the Supreme People's Court Monday morning at the First Session of the 11th National People's Congress (NPC).

Following are the highlights of Xiao's report distributed to journalists at the third plenary meeting of the annual parliamentary session:

Trial and judicial assistance

-- From 2003 to 2007, the Supreme People's Court dealt with 20,451 cases of various types, an increase of 0.78 percent over the previous five-year period. It also supervised and guided courts at local levels and special courts to conclude 31.784 million cases, up 1.59 percent.

-- From 2003 to 2007, the Supreme People's Court handled 4,802 criminal cases, supervised and guided local courts to conclude 3.385 million criminal cases at first trial. The combined number increased by 19.61 percent over the previous five years. A total of 760,000 criminals were sentenced to death, life imprisonment, or more than five years in prison, accounting for 18.18 percent of all criminals having been sentenced.

-- In the five years, Chinese courts concluded 1.2 million explosion, homicide, kidnapping and robbery cases, up 10.09 percent; concluded more than 80,000 cases involving smuggling, fake and substandard product production and sale, and financial order breach, up 11.76 percent; concluded 2,962 intellectual property right infringement cases, up 133 percent; concluded 120,000 embezzlement, bribery and duty dereliction cases, up 12.15 percent

-- In the five years, the Supreme People's Court adjudicated 3,196 civil cases, supervised and guided local courts to conclude 22.145 million civil cases at first trial, down 6.25 percent.

-- The Supreme People's Court handled 1,242 administrative cases and 313 state compensation cases. It also supervised and guided local courts to conclude more than 470,000 administrative cases at first trial, up 1.5 percent; 13,000 state compensation cases, up 17.31 percent, with compensation sum totaling 180 million yuan, up 6.26 percent.

-- Chinese courts provided judicial assistance to 1.27 million litigants who suffered financial difficulty, up 115 percent from the previous five-year period; postponed, reduced and exempted litigation fee worth 5.48 billion yuan, up 71.25 percent.

Progress in judicial reform

Judicial reform made significant progress in the past five years to improve the trial system with Chinese characteristics, namely the improvement of death penalty review system, retrial system in civil cases, enforcement system in civil cases, people's juror system, and trial management system.

Work in 2008

-- to strengthen the work of the people's courts and promote social fairness and justice guided by the theory of socialism with Chinese characteristics;

-- to do well trial and enforcement, strive to dissolve disputes and maintain social harmony and stability;

-- to correct unjust rulings with the guidance of "fair judicial work and trial for the people";

-- to push forward reform in the people's court system and optimize the distribution of interior power;

-- to strengthen the infrastructure of grassroots courts and raise their judicial capability;

-- to improve the competence of judges.

(Xinhua News Agency March 10, 2008)