Spotlight: Foreign scholars, media comment on Sixth Plenary Session of 18th CPC Central Committee

The Communist Party of China (CPC) has been a tower of strength in leading the country's steady and sound economic and social development since the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, foreign scholars and media have said.

In an interview with Xinhua in the wake of the Sixth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee this week, Jose Luis Leon-Manriquez, a professor of International and East Asian Studies at the Metropolitan Autonomous University in Mexico, praised the CPC's leading role in China's reform and opening-up, as well as the combination of macro-control and market economy system carried out since 1978.

The CPC's choice of socialism with Chinese characteristics has awakened the Asian giant, as China has now become the world's second-largest economy, Leon-Manriquez said.

By creating China's own model for socialism, the CPC has led the world's most populous country toward a unique path which ensures a better quality of life for its people. Other countries could learn from this model, he said.

"The CPC has been most helpful in bringing China to the world economic and political center," he said.

Ignacio Martinez Cortes, a researcher on Chinese Affairs at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, also spoke highly of the Sixth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee held from Monday to Thursday.

The session is very important for the party, as self-discipline and stricter governance will standardize the CPC's political life and strengthen intra-party supervision, Cortes said.

He also praised the CPC's increasing efforts in the anti-corruption campaign over the past several years. The zero-tolerance policy applied by the party has ensured a positive and healthy political life, he said.

"China is now building a new path of development based on an inclusive and green economy as well as a harmonious society, which says no to corruption," he said.

"Chinese President Xi Jinping has a strong will and has been playing the leading role in the anti-corruption campaign," he noted.

Chen Gang, senior research fellow at the East Asian Institute of the National University of Singapore, also highlighted the importance of strengthening the CPC's governance, which is the topic of the session.

"To strengthen governance of the party means to normalize anti-corruption policies. Standardizing political life and fighting against corruption will be a long-term policy in intra-party governance," Chen said.

Chen believed that more detailed documents on norms of intra-party political life under current conditions are on the way, which will further strengthen the CPC as a steady leading power of socialism with Chinese characteristics.

The Japanese daily newspaper the Mainichi said the documents approved by the session helped institutionalize the CPC's anti-corruption efforts, and the zero-tolerance policy carried out by the party serves as the guiding principle for the anti-corruption campaign in the future.

Yazaki Mitsuharu, head of the secretariat of the Japan-China Friendship Association, spoke highly of the documents approved by the session on standardizing political life and strengthening intra-party governance.

These documents can help fight against corruption and wipe out people's distrust of the government. They are crucial to the institutionalization of anti-corruption and the improvement of the rule of law, and also a key step toward a comprehensive suppression of corruption in the future, Mitsuharu said. Endi