(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-01-26 16:06

BEIJING - Guo Jinlong, acting mayor of Beijing, was elected mayor on Saturday at the first session of the 13th Beijing Municipal People's Congress, the local legislative body.

Newly elected Beijing Mayor Guo Jinlong addresses a press conference after the first session of the 13th Beijing Municipal People's Congress in Beijing on January 26, 2008. [Xinhua]

Legislators also elected nine vice mayors at the meeting, including a 42-year-old non-Communist woman, Cheng Hong, of the China Democratic League.

"We will always hold high the great banner of socialism with Chinese characteristics ... to open up new phases in the modernization drive of the Chinese capital," Guo told reporters after the local legislative body ended its week-long annual session on Saturday.

"We must continue to deepen reform and expand opening up," he said.

Newly elected Beijing municipal government leaders meet the press after the first session of the 13th Beijing Municipal People's Congress in Beijing on January 26, 2008. [Xinhua]

As mayor of the host city of 2008 Olympic Games, Guo also pledged all-out efforts to ensure the success of the event.

"We must host a high-caliber Olympics and Paralymics with distinction, and make the best preparations and provide the best services and support," he said.

Guo, born in July 1947, is a native of Nanjing, east China's Jiangsu Province. He joined the Communist Party of China (CPC) in April 1979.

Guo has a bachelor degree in physics from Nanjing University and began working as a technician in southwest China's Sichuan Province in 1969.

He served as secretary of the CPC Tibet Autonomous Regional Committee from October 2000 to December 2004, and secretary of the CPC Anhui Provincial Committee from December 2004 to November 2007.

He was appointed vice and acting mayor of Beijing by the Standing Committee of the Beijing Municipal People's Congress on November 30 last year.

He is a member of the 17th CPC Central Committee.