China's first circuit court established in Shenzhen

SHENZHEN -- A new court was inaugurated in south China on Wednesday as part of a reorganization designed to better allocate cases and work across the country's court system.

The First Circuit Court of China's Supreme People's Court (SPC), inaugurated in Shenzhen City of Guangdong Province, will mainly handle major administrative, civil and commercial cases which should be heard by the SPC, in the provinces of Guangdong and Hainan, and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

A Second Circuit Court will be set up in Shenyang of northeast China's Liaoning Province to cover the provinces of Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang, according to a document issued by the SPC on Wednesday.

Both courts will start to take and hear cases from Sunday.

It was decided to establish the circuit courts at the fourth plenary session of the 18th Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee in late October, 2014.

The SPC has said they will facilitate the public to file cases in local communities and get their disputes solved more quickly and locally. They will also free up SPC headquarters to concentrate on judicial policies and trying more complex cases that "have profound significance in unifying the application of law," according to the SPC.

The circuit courts are adjudicatory organs designated by the SPC and their judgements, orders and decisions equal those of the SPC, said Wednesday's document.

It stipulated 11 categories of case that will be handled by the circuit courts, including nationwide administrative cases of first instance, civil and commercial cases of first instance with significant influence across the country, cases transferred by the higher people's courts due to jurisdiction, administrative, civil and commercial cases and judicial assistance cases concerning Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan, as well as other cases the SPC decides to be tried by the circuit courts.

Intellectual property rights, foreign-related commercial, maritime, death penalty review, national compensation, ruling enforcement as well as cases of protests lodged by the SPC will still be handled by SPC headquarters.

All the judges working in the circuit courts will be selected and sent by the SPC.

A bi-monthly legislative session of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress appointed Liu Guixiang and Hu Yunteng president of the circuit court in Shenzhen and Shenyang respectively in late December, 2014.