China's top judge delivers report on work of Supreme People's Court

The President of the Supreme People's Court Xiao Yang delivers a work report of the Supreme People's Court during the third plenary meeting of the First Session of the 11th National People's Congress (NPC) at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, March 10, 2008. (Xinhua/Li Xueren)

BEIJING, March 10 (Xinhua) -- China's top judge and president of the Supreme People's Court Xiao Yang started to deliver a report on the work of the Supreme People's Court at the national legislature here Monday morning.

Chinese leaders Hu Jintao, Wu Bangguo, Wen Jiabao, Jia Qinglin, Zeng Qinghong, Li Changchun, Xi Jinping, Li Keqiang, He Guoqiang and Zhou Yongkang attended the third plenary meeting of the First Session of the 11th National People's Congress.

    "The transition work has been smooth, orderly and trials of death sentence cases normal," Xiao, president of the Supreme People's Court and chief justice, said in his work report to the ongoing session of the Parliament, without elaboration.

    Xiao said the SPC has in the past year improved the procedure for second instance trials of death sentence cases and the procedure for the final review of death penalty with unified criteria applied.

    "The SPC has been working to ensure that the capital punishment only applies to the very few number of felons who committed extremely serious, atrocious crimes that lead to grave social consequences," Xiao told the lawmakers.