National People's Congress closes annual session

The 14th National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, on Tuesday concluded its third annual session.

President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, and other Chinese leaders attended the closing meeting held at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing.

Li Hongzhong, vice chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, delivered a speech at the meeting.

At the meeting, NPC deputies passed the resolutions on the government work report, and the work reports of the NPC Standing Committee, the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate, as well as an amendment to the Law on Deputies to the National People's Congress and to the Local People's Congresses at Various Levels.

They also passed the resolutions on the implementation of the 2024 plan for national economic and social development and the plan for 2025, and on the implementation of the central and local budgets in 2024 and the budgets for 2025.

The deputies approved the national economic and social development plan for 2025 and the central budget for 2025.

The NPC is China's highest organ of power through which the Chinese people exercise their state power. It focuses on major national-level political and socioeconomic development issues.

This year's session of the NPC opened on March 5.

National People's Congress closes annual session

National People's Congress closes annual session

The multilateral system is "under attack" amid global turmoil, President of the 80th UN General Assembly Annalena Baerbock warned in her remarks on Wednesday.

In her briefing on the priorities for the resumed 80th Session of the General Assembly, the UNGA president noted that the current multilateral system does not collapse all in a sudden, but "crumbles piece by piece" in divisions, compromises, and lack of political commitment.

The president called all the UN member states to defend the UN Charter and international law and promote cross-regional cooperation.

She also urged to push forward the work of the UNGA on certain critical issues with a strong majority, rather than an absolute consensus among all member states. Such act is not a failure of multilateralism, but "an affirmation of it," she said.

The foundational principles of the institution should not be eroded by appeasement, she said, calling the member states to show courage, leadership, and responsibility at the UN's "critical make-or-break moment."

"The UN needs you. Your support, your leadership, your principle, stand, your cross-regional cooperation, if we are to preserve and modernize this institution, if we are to make it, rather than break it," she said.

UNGA President warns global multilateral system "under attack"