Full text: National Human Rights Action Plan of China (2016-2020)(7)

Amending the Regulations on Religious Affairs, regularizing in accordance with the law the conduct of the government in managing religious affairs, and protecting the lawful rights and interests of religious believers.

-- Supporting the efforts of the religious circles for self-improvement to enhance their capabilities for self-regulation, self-discipline and self-management. Necessary support and assistance shall be provided for religious groups to hold activities.

-- Encouraging religious circles to organize charity activities in accordance with the law.

-- Making efforts to run the religious institutes well, improving the training of religious professionals, and improving the qualities of faculty and staff of the religious institutes.

-- Halting investments in and commercial use of venues for religious activities, and prohibiting the "contracting" of Buddhist monasteries and Taoist temples.

-- Improving organization and services for the Islamic Hajj.

-- Actively engaging in religious exchanges with the outside world.

(4) Rights to know and to participate

Expanding the citizens' right to know through various channels and in various fields, and increasing the means and forms of their orderly participation in social governance.

-- Further pressing forward with making public the lists of powers and responsibilities for easier supervision by the public. The people's governments at all levels and their subordinate departments shall make public their functions, responsibilities, powers, administrative procedures and means of accepting public supervision.

-- Introducing the system of publicity for administrative law enforcement.

-- Improving the construction of online administrative information data platform and public service platform, and promoting IT application to make governmental affairs more open and easier to access.

-- Improving the information disclosure system for emergencies.

-- Disclosing information about police, prison, adjudicative and procuratorial affairs. Information shall be released in time about the basis, procedures, processes and results of judicature and law enforcement in accordance with the law, and a system of unified online announcement and open inquiry shall be established for effective legal documents.

-- Enlarging public involvement in legislation. Exploration shall be made for the establishment of a mechanism in which the state organs, social groups, specialists and scholars provide argument and consultation for the adjustment of major interests in the process of legislation, thus expanding the channels for the public's orderly participation in legislation, and improving the mechanisms of soliciting public opinion for the drafting of laws, regulations and provisions, and giving feedbacks to the public.

-- Implementing the plan of doubling the number of people's jurors, expanding the channels and scope of their selection and appointment, and specifying their functions and powers.

-- Improving the mechanism of having specially-invited procurators, and taking effective measures to ensure they perform their duties in accordance with the law and involve in the deliberation of procuratorial affairs.

-- Improving the people's supervisor system. The selection, appointment and management of people's supervisors shall be improved, their rights be fully protected, and the channels be expanded for the public's orderly participation in judicial affairs.

-- Ensuring public participation in judicial mediation and hearing, and addressing petition letters and visits in relation to legal proceedings.

-- Bringing into play the positive role of citizens' code of conduct, village regulations and folk conventions, and statutes of trades and social groups in social governance, and advancing self-governance of society.

-- Supporting social organizations to participate in the provision of social services. Efforts shall be made to develop social work service agencies and voluntary service associations, promote the separation of trade associations from administrative bodies, facilitate the orderly development of charity organizations, and improve the systems of registration and management of social organizations and of government buying services from them.

-- Revising the Organic Law on Urban Residents' Committees, and accelerating the pace of formulating or amending supporting laws and regulations of the Organic Law on Villagers' Committees. Efforts shall be made to forge ahead with transparency of the work of urban residents' and villagers' committees, and encourage democratic participation by urban and rural residents.

-- Improving the system of democratic management of enterprises and public institutions in the form of employees' congresses. Efforts shall be made to press forward with institutionalization and normalization of information disclosure in enterprises and public institutions, and ensure employees' right to know and to participate in democratic management.

(5) Rights of expression and supervision

Giving more space to public opinion, increasing the means and channels of expression, improving the check and supervision system for the operation of power, and protecting in accordance with the law the citizens' rights of free expression and democratic supervision.

-- Protecting the citizens' freedom of speech on the Internet in accordance with the law. Services shall be further improved for netizens to express their opinions, and great store shall be set on social sentiments and public opinions as expressed on the Internet.

-- Establishing a registration system for complaints about and reports of unlawful acts by state organs at all levels, smoothing out such supervisory channels as informants' letterbox, complaint e-mail and hotline, so as to give full play to public supervision.

-- Improving the regulations regarding the people's complaints and promoting law-based handling of such complaints. Mechanisms shall be improved to separate litigations from complaints, and bring to conclusion all petitions relating to legal proceedings lodged by way of letters or personal visits to relevant government departments. A platform integrating accusation, offence reporting, appeal, complaint, consultation and search shall be built, online processing of complaints shall be encouraged, and complaints shall be classified and handled in accordance with the law. Citizens' rational and lawful appeals shall be resolved in accordance with legal provisions and procedures.

-- Amending the Administrative Reconsideration Law, and protecting citizens' and social organizations' rights to supervise administrative bodies by applying for administrative reconsideration. Oversight shall be strengthened on civil servants' violations of law and discipline.

-- Giving full play to supervision by newspapers, magazines, radio, television and other types of traditional media, increasing the interaction between traditional media and new media like the Internet, and highlighting law-based online supervision. Protection in accordance with the law shall be extended to the rights of news agencies and their staff to information, interview, publication, criticism and supervision.

-- Improving the system of constitutional supervision by the National People's Congress (NPC) and its Standing Committee, and the mechanism of procedures for the interpretation of the Constitution. The legislative recording and review system and capability building shall be improved, and all normative documents shall be brought into the scope of such recording and review. All normative documents that violate the Constitution or laws shall be abrogated or corrected. Systems shall be improved by which the people's congresses discuss and decide on major issues, and governments at all levels report to the people's congresses at the same level before making major policy decisions.

-- Building a platform of consultation for the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), and enriching the contents and forms of consultation. Targeting issues bearing on overall social and economic development and the people's immediate interests, CPPCC will conduct extensive consultation. The mechanisms of organizing democratic supervision, safeguarding related rights and interests, providing feedbacks, and facilitating communication and coordination shall be improved.

-- Improving auditing supervision. The auditing management system conducive to exercising the right of auditing supervision independently and in accordance with the law shall be improved, and an auditing personnel management system with distinctive professional features shall be established, so as to form a system of auditing supervision commensurate to the modernization of a national governance system and capacity. Full coverage of auditing shall be endeavored over public funds, state-owned assets and resources, as well as leading officials' performance of economic duties. (mo