Ethnic minorities, women, children, disabled effectively protected: report

BEIJING - China has taken measures to effectively protect the rights and interests of ethnic minorities, women, children, and people with disabilities, according to a report reviewing the human rights development from 2012 to 2015 published by the Chinese government on Tuesday.

The right of ethnic minorities to participate on an equal footing in the management of state and social affairs has been protected in accordance with the law. All 55 ethnic-minority groups in China have representatives in the National People's Congress (NPC).

The number of poverty-stricken people in the 5 autonomous regions of Inner Mongolia, Guangxi, Tibet, Ningxia and Xinjiang and the 3 provinces of Guizhou, Yunnan and Qinghai plummeted from 31.21 million in 2012 to 18.13 million in 2015, according to the report.

In the same period, it added, the GDP of the eight ethnic minority regions increased from 5850.5 billion yuan to 7473.6 billion yuan, and the per capita disposable income of permanent residents in cities and towns soared from 20,542 yuan to 26,901 yuan.

The development of education among ethnic minorities has gained speed, the document said. Boarding school students from ethnic groups with a relatively small population who receive compulsory education in rural areas are provided with a living allowance at a standard rate of 250 yuan per person per annum.

Every year, a separate compulsory education aid of 20 million yuan is set aside for the special purpose of subsidizing the living allowances of poverty-stricken students in boarding schools in the Tibet Autonomous Region, the report read.

The government launched the standard high school construction project in ethnic minority regions with a weak educational infrastructure, with 7 billion yuan appropriated from the central budget from 2012 to 2015 in support of the construction of 318 standard high schools in ethnic minority regions.

The report also said, women enjoy the chance to participate on an equal footing with men in the management of state and social affairs. Female deputies account for 23.4 percent of all deputies in the 12th NPC, 2.07 percentage points higher than the previous congress.

In 2014, females in enterprises made up 40.1 percent and 41.5 percent of the members on boards of directors and boards of supervisors, respectively.

Women enjoy the equal right with men to employment. In 2014, female employees accounted for 44.8 percent of all people employed across the country.

The level of health services for women has been raised continuously, the report said.

During the period of 2011-2015, nearly 50 million pregnant women in rural areas received hospital delivery subsidies, and the rate of women in the countryside giving birth in hospitals increased from 97.8 percent in 2010 to 99.5 percent in 2015.

The maternal mortality rate lowered from 30 out of 100,000 in 2010 to 20.1 in every 100,000 in 2015. By the end of 2015, 51.95 million and 7.47 million rural women had free tests for cervical cancer and breast cancer, respectively, the document read.

The state legislated to protect women from domestic violence. On December 27, 2015, the NPC Standing Committee adopted the Anti-domestic Violence Law, in which systems, such as police cautions, writ of habeas corpus and mandatory reporting, were specially set up.

Children's right to health is effectively guaranteed, the report said. The mortality rate of infants reduced from 13.1 per thousand in 2010 to 8.1 per thousand in 2015. And the mortality rate of children under the age of five was 10.7 per thousand, 5.7 per thousand lower than in 2010.

Female minors' rights are further protected. The Amendment (IX) to the Criminal Law abolished the crime of prostituting female minors under the age of 14, improving the legal system on protecting female minors from sexual abuse.

The state continues to launch special operations to combat attempts to identify the sex of a fetus other than for medical purposes and attempts to terminate a pregnancy once the sex of a fetus identified is not desired, the document read.

In 2015, in terms of the gender ratio, for every 100 females there were 113.5 males, the seventh narrowing of the gap in a row since 2009, it continued.

By 2015, the state had established a living subsidy system for the financially-challenged disabled population and nursing care allowances for the severely disabled across the country.
During the period of 2012-2015, 4.962 million impoverished people with disabilities in rural areas were lifted out of poverty and 3.17 million poor disabled residents in rural areas received skills training.

Besides, the central government allocated a total of 3.74 billion yuan in rehabilitation and poverty-relief interest-deducted loans to support 743,000 impoverished disabled people. The state subsidized the renovation of dilapidated houses of 1.164 million rural households with disabled members, the report said.