Full Text: Progress in China's Human Rights in 2014

VI. Rights of Women, Children and Senior Citizens

In 2014 the Chinese government further implemented the basic national policy of equality between men and women, and the principle that "the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration," and built up a system of old-age services and related businesses, so as to better protect the legitimate rights and interests of women, children and senior citizens.

Women's right to participation in public affairs management protected in accordance with the law. The mechanism for assessing relevant laws and policies concerning gender equality was improved. By the end of 2014 Beijing and Tianjin cities, and Shanxi, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, Hubei and Sichuan provinces had established their own mechanisms for assessing the effects of regulations and policies from the perspective of gender so as to avoid institutional gender discrimination caused by improper stipulations. Efforts were made to include rural women into the village branch committees of the CPC and the villagers' committees when a new round of election of these two committees was conducted, and to improve the work of women's deliberative councils, boards of women directors, mutual-assistance groups of women in the countryside whose husbands are seeking employment in cities, and women volunteers. In 2014 more than 33,000 such mutual-assistance groups were set up, and 2.22 million women volunteers were registered.

Employment of women effectively increased. In 2014 some 217.275 billion yuan of small-sum secured loans were granted to women, and 18.681 billion yuan of subsidies for interest discount were issued from central and local government budgets, benefiting 4.59 million women. Training of a new type of professional women farmers was offered to enhance their market competitiveness. Some 17,000 modern agricultural scientific and technological demonstration bases at various levels run by women received government support, more than 4,000 domestic service training bases were built for women, more than 580,000 women received training, and more than 600,000 women found jobs as domestic helpers. Efforts were made to help more than 500,000 female students in 227 colleges and universities find jobs or start businesses through publicity of employment policies and by provision of information on job vacancies.

The rights of the person of women and children better protected. In 2014 the people' s courts at various levels concluded 1,048 criminal cases involving the kidnapping of women and children and sexual assault on minors, resulting in 876 criminals sentenced to five years' imprisonment or more, with some receiving the death penalty. The Opinions on Law-based Handling of Crimes of Domestic Violence was enacted to provide legislation for the punishment of domestic violence in accordance with the law. In February 2014 the Supreme People' s Court held a press conference focusing on domestic violence cases handled by the people' s courts in recent years, citing 10 typical cases as examples, which improved the consistent application of the laws in tackling domestic violence. By the end of 2014 a total of 29 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the central government had enacted local regulations and policies to prevent and deter domestic violence. The Anti-domestic Violence Law of the People ' s Republic of China (draft) was published to solicit the public's opinions.

Efforts were made to improve the joint response mechanism for protecting minors, which featured "monitoring for prevention, timely reporting of clues, and assistance and intervention," to build a nationwide social protection network for minors, and to explore a guardian system with "family guardianship as the basis, public supervision as the guarantee, and state guardianship as the supplement," so as to form a working structure for the protection of minors that integrates efforts of family, society and government.

In December 2014 the Supreme People's Court, Supreme People's Procuratorate, Ministry of Public Security and Ministry of Civil Affairs jointly released the Opinions on Law-based Handling of the Infringement of the Rights and Interests of Minors by Their Guardians, which made explicit stipulations, created a mechanism for reporting and handling the infringement as soon as it occurs, specified the requirements for the trial of cases involving guardianship transfer, and defined the duties of civil affairs departments, courts, prosecution organs and public security organs. The Tongshan District People's Court of Xuzhou City, Jiangsu Province, concluded the first case in China that stripped the parents of their guardianship of their minor child. The practice of "round-table trial" of cases involving minor suspects was improved, and the system of sealing up criminal records of minors was followed.