China's top leaders, including Chairman Jiang Zemin of the Central Military Commission and Premier Wen Jiabao, joined the panel discussions of lawmakers and political advisors on separate occasions Saturday and expressed their views on the development of the country.

After listening to legislators from Shanghai, China's biggest metropolis, Jiang called for efforts to seize the strategic opportunity of the first 20 years of the new century to boost development in order to continue improving the people's living standard and to grasp the initiative in international competition.

"To accelerate development, we must join international economic and technological cooperation in a wider scope and a broader field and at a higher level, make full use of domestic and international markets, and optimize the allocation of resources," Jiang said.

In developing an outward-oriented economy, it is imperative to pay equal importance to introducing foreign capital and technology and encouraging Chinese enterprises to go abroad for business operations, with emphasis placed on the fields of modern services, equipment manufacturing and new and high technology, he said.

Jiang also stressed the importance of innovation in science and technology, management systems and the cultural sphere in the nationwide pursuit of coordinated development of socialist material civilization, political civilization and spiritual civilization.

Premier Wen, during discussions with legislators from the northeastern province of Heilongjiang, focused on the rule of law, saying that governments at all levels should administer according to law and all government workers should learn to handle economic and social affairs according to law.

Jia Qinglin, chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, China's top advisory body, spoke positively on the implementation of the "one country, two systems" principle and the basic laws since Hong Kong and Macao returned China.

Jia told members of the advisory body from Hong Kong and Macao that the central government always believes the overwhelming majority of Hong Kong and Macao compatriots support the principle, and compatriots in the two regions are fully competent and have their ways to manage the two regions well.

Wu Guanzheng, head of the Communist Party of China (CPC)'s Central Discipline Inspection Commission, concentrated on the establishment and perfection of an anti-corruption system that fits the country's socialist market economic system, when he joined legislators from Shandong Province in east China.

During discussion with legislators from the wealthy southern province of Guangdong, Li Changchun, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, emphasized the necessity to establish and carry out a scientific approach to development in line with the realities of China's reform, opening up and modernization drive.

Luo Gan, also a member of the Political Bureau Standing Committee of the CPC Central Committee, called for efforts to crack down on various crimes and help resolve the problems of the ordinary people in order to maintain social stability and a good public order, during discussion with lawmakers from Fujian Province in east China.

(Xinhua News? Agency? March 7, 2004)