Leading local, foreign dignitaries meet to mark CPC's 100th year

HONG KONG - Leading dignitaries from overseas and locally on Wednesday put their heads together at a seminar in Hong Kong, celebrating the centenary of the Communist Party of China.

The full-day international symposium, held online and offline, is part of an array of activities to mark the upcoming 100th anniversary of the CPC, which falls on July 1.

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheung Yuet-ngor, deputy chief of the Liaison Office of the Central People's Government in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Tan Tieniu, and Liu Guangyuan, the Foreign Ministry's commissioner in Hong Kong SAR, officiated at the opening of the symposium.

Addressing the event, Tan said over the past 100 years, the CPC has led the Chinese nation to emerge from obscurity and made significant contributions to global development, safeguarding world peace and international order.

It is committed to a development path that suits China's national conditions, refusing to be confined to the beaten track or to copy the models used by others, Tan said.

He cited a poll, released last July by Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government, that Chinese people's satisfaction with the central government stood high at 93 percent, which is a living embodiment of the public's recognition of the Party.

A group of eight keynote speakers, including former prime minister of Japan Yukio Hatoyama, former chief economist of Goldman Sachs Jim O'Neill and the former senior fellow at Cambridge University Martin Jacques are set to share their insights in the events.

In the afternoon, a roundtable panel discussion will be held among 10 other heavyweights, including John Ross, former director of the Department of Economy and Business Policy for the Mayor of London, Allan Zeman, chairman of the Lan Kwai Fong Group, and Robert Griffiths, general secretary of the Communist Party of Britain.

The seminar was jointly organized by the Liaison Office of the Central People's Government in the HKSAR and Bauhinia Culture, a Hong Kong-based media group.