China’s Permanent Representative to the UN and Other International Organizations in Vienna Ambassador Li Song's Keynote Speech at the Meeting of the 'Friends of IACA'

Dean Mr. Kos,
Excellencies, colleagues and friends,

Last week when I met with Dean Kos and his team to prepare for today's event, I shared with him some of my personal understanding and thinking regarding China's unique national practices and successful experience on anti-corruption under the strong leadership of China's ruling party, CPC.

We believe that this framework of "Friends of IACA" could also serve as good opportunities for colleagues to share their national experiences and good practices on anti-corruption in an informal manner, which could serve as some useful plus to the formal functions and activities of IACA.

I would like to take this opportunity to make my try.

This year marks the 105th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, CPC. Starting with only 58 members in 1921, the CPC has grown into the world's largest ruling party with over 100 million members and significant global influence. In other words, among 14 people in China, there is one party member of CPC.

Over the past century, the CPC has been uniting and leading the Chinese people to achieve national independence and liberation, to pioneer and uphold the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics, to forge a new path of China's modernization, turning China from a poor, divided semi-colonized country into a modern, socialism country, the world's second-largest economy.

The CPC is from the people, of the people, for the people and serve the people. This is the key to CPC's successful performance and governance, winning the heartfelt support of the Chinese people. More importantly, the CPC has always attached great importance to its own construction, resolutely eliminating all factors that might damage and endanger the Party's advanced nature, its purity and integrity, and eradicating all viruses that erode the Party's healthy performance.

Since its 18th National Congress in 2012, under the leadership of General Secretary Xi Jinping as its core, the CPC has incorporated comprehensively and systematically strengthening Party's discipline based on highlighting the value and behavior of all the Party members, into the national development strategy. Due to time restraint, I would like only to highlight two prominent examples illustrate this.

Firstly, since 2012, the CPC Central Committee began by formulating and implementing the Eight-Point Regulation, imposing strict requirements on the working style, professional ethics, and moral standards of Party members, resolutely opposing an preventing privileged thinking, formalism, bureaucracy, hedonism and extravagance, with a view to continuously improving in Party conduct and government conduct.

Secondly, the CPC Central Committee led all Party members in establishing and practicing a correct view of performance, further highlighting the importance of serving the public, benefiting the people, making scientific decisions, and working diligently and pragmatically. Such requirements apply to the whole ranges of governance practice, specifically indicating what should be the good or best performance, and what kind of bad performance should be firmly rejected by party members, first and foremost by key officials of all levels of party and government leadership.

All of the above have a lot to do to CPC's firm and effective efforts against corruption. Among leaders of ruling parties all over the world, President Xi Jinping is the one who has been highlighting the importance and elaborating efforts on anti-corruption most insistingly, frequently and consistently over the past decade.

Since the reform and opening up by the end of the 1970's, China's economy and society have developed rapidly. At the same time, corruption has become a serious challenge that must be faced and addressed in the process of development. The CPC believes that anti-corruption is not only about punishing corrupt behaviors, but also a crucial way to promote the modernization of national governance.

Under General Secretary Xi Jinping's leadership, the CPC Central Committee, with a motto of "Rather to offend thousands of corrupted officials than to fail 1.4 billion of the Chinese population", launched an unprecedented nation-wide anti-corruption campaign, comprehensively improving the anti-corruption system and mechanisms from legislative, administrative, and judicial perspectives.

Over the past 14 years, disciplinary inspection and supervision organs nationwide have investigated and dealt with approximately 7 million cases of "big tigers" or "small flies" violations of laws and regulations, achieving an overwhelming victory in the anti-corruption struggle, which continues to be consolidated and developed.

Thank all of you for listening to the stories that I have shared about CPC's leadership in anti-corruption efforts in China. I hope they are helpful for you to better understand the CPC, as well as why China can by so effective and resultful in its anti-corruption campaign.

The anti-corruption campaign led by the CPC has laid a solid foundation for China's participation in international anti-corruption cooperation and global governance. China has concluded extradition treaties, mutual legal assistance treaties, and asset return and sharing agreements with more than 80 countries, achieving positive results in the pursuit of fugitives and the recovery of illicit assets. As one of the first signatories to the UNCAC, China fully fulfills the Convention obligations, promotes the construction of a clean Silk Road, and makes positive contributions to global anti-corruption governance.

Last September, President Xi Jinping proposed Global Governance Initiative, which upholds five core principles: sovereign equality, international rule of law, multilateralism, people-centered approach, and real actions. These principles provide valuable insights for international cooperation in combating corruption.

China has consistently and actively supported the work of the IACA and highly values its unique role and influence. We expects IACA to leverage its strengths to strengthen its anti-corruption curriculum, fully considering the differences in national systems, development stages, and national conditions, and utilizing training and education to enhance the anti-corruption capacity building of developing countries, reducing corruption at its source, and contributing to global common development through clean governance.

China is also willing to engage in in-depth exchanges with all parties through the IACA platform and the Friends of IACA framework, to share best practices in anti-corruption, jointly support the IACA's steady and long-term development, and promote the construction of a more just and equitable global anti-corruption governance system.

Thank you for your attention.