Children chat at the graduation day from kindergarten in Lhasa, capital of southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, July 12, 2019. (Xinhua/Jigme Dorje)
According to the diplomat, China's successful practice shows that there is no one-size-fits-all development model in the world, and there are more paths to human rights promotion than just the Western model.
GENEVA, Sept. 14 (Xinhua) -- China has painted a glorious chapter of human rights promotion in the past 70 years since the founding of the People's Republic of China under the strong leadership of the Communist Party of China, a Chinese diplomat said here Friday.
Liu Hua, the special representative for human rights affairs of China's Foreign Ministry, who is here to attend the ongoing 42nd session of the UN Human Rights Council, made the remarks during an interview with Xinhua.
"After 70 years of efforts, China has become the world's second largest economy. Last year, its GDP exceeded 90 trillion yuan (about 12.7 trillion U.S. dollars), contributing more than 30 percent to world economic growth for many years," she said.
What's more, she said, China has solved the food and clothing problem for nearly 1.4 billion people, and reduced the number of poverty population by 850 million, accounting for more than 70 percent of the global poverty reduction.
Liu cited a UN report regarding China as one of the fastest-progressing countries in the past more than 30 years, and a World Bank report praising China's poverty alleviation as one of the greatest stories in human history.
Aerial photo taken on April 7, 2019 shows a villager selecting tea leaves at a tea planting base in Baogai Town of Hengnan County, central China's Hunan Province. Tea planting bases are built in Baogai to provide jobs for local villagers as a method of poverty alleviation in recent years. (Xinhua/Cao Zhengping)
Beside the economic achievements, Liu said the Chinese people's civil and political rights have been greatly improved.
For example, she said, China has formed a comprehensive legal guarantee system for human rights protection, and already issued three national action plans for human rights promotion.
At the same time, China has strictly implemented the "principle of legality" and "presumption of innocence," established the world's largest database for legal judgment documents, and comprehensively improved the rule of law.
According to a credible international survey, China is one of the safest and most dynamic countries in the world with the highest satisfaction among the people, she said.
"China's nearly 1.4 billion people live a peaceful, free and happy life, the fact itself is the biggest human rights achievement and the best human rights practice in the world," she said.
According to the diplomat, China's successful practice shows that there is no one-size-fits-all development model in the world, and there are more paths to human rights promotion than just the Western model.
As for the participation of China in the international human rights cooperation, the diplomat said that China has always upheld the spirit of equality, mutual trust, mutual understanding and learning, and win-win cooperation.
"China will continue to make contributions to promoting the establishment of a fair and reasonable international human rights system," she said. ■
