Chinese President Xi Jinping urged the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the Chinese People to "stay committed to advancing reform and opening-up" at a conference celebrating the 40th anniversary of China's reform and opening-up on Tuesday.

"We will create new and even greater wonders of the Chinese nation in the new era, wonders that will truly impress the world," said Xi, also general secretary of the CPC Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, in a speech at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing.

He reviewed the history of the landmark program that has transformed the once poor country into the world's second-largest economy and outlined nine principles guiding a new round of reform and opening-up.

The nation must uphold the CPC leadership's over all work, adhere to the people-oriented approach, uphold Marxism as its guiding ideology, stay on the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics, improve and develop the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, continue to take development as the top priority, promote joint efforts to build a community with a shared future for mankind, exercise full and rigorous governance over the Party, and strike a balance between reform, development and stability, Xi stressed.

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CPC's leadership and people-oriented approach

"We must see the Party exercise its leadership over all work and keep enhancing and improving its way of leadership," Xi said in his speech, calling the CPC leadership the "most essential attribute of socialism with Chinese characteristics."

To address risks and challenges on the future path of reform and opening-up, he called on the Party to improve the way it exercises leadership and governance, and strengthen its ability and resolve to "craft overall plans, design policy, and promote reform."

Meanwhile, Xi said the country "must adhere to the people-oriented approach and keep delivering on the aspirations of the people for a better life."

China must improve its democratic institutions, establish more democratic channels, diversify its forms of democracy and strengthen the rule of law to enable the people to "truly and fully enjoy a broad range of democratic rights that are tangible, meaningful and practical as prescribed by law," Xi noted.

The Chinese president urged the whole nation to tackle the "contradiction between unbalanced and inadequate development and the people's ever-growing needs for a better life," – the principal contradiction in the Chinese society that Xi defined in his report to the 19th CPC National Congress last year.

'No textbook of golden rules'

Stressing that the country must uphold and advance socialism with Chinese characteristics, Xi said: "There is no textbook of golden rules to follow for reform and development in China," adding that "No one is in a position to dictate to the Chinese people what should or should not be done."

The right of the people of all countries to choose their own development path must be respected, he told the audience.

While underlining China's determination to chart its own course, Xi also reiterated the country's commitment to opening its door wider and engaging in win-win cooperation with the international community.

As experience in the past four decades has shown, "China cannot develop itself in isolation of the world, and the world needs China for global prosperity," he said, noting that Beijing will stay committed to its foreign policy goal of maintaining world peace and promoting common development.

'Game-changing move'

Summarizing China's achievements over the past 40 years, Xi hailed reform and opening-up a "game-changing move in making China what it is today" and to achieve its great national rejuvenation.

On December 18, 1978, the Third Plenary Session of the 11th CPC Central Committee was convened at an "important historic juncture when the Party and our country were at crossroads," he said.

The meeting, held two years after the end of the devastating Cultural Revolution, marked a "major turning point" in the Party's history and heralded the start of the "great journey of reform, opening-up and socialist modernization" in China, the president noted.

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In the past 40 years, China's gross domestic product (GDP) grew from 367.9 billion yuan to 82.7 trillion yuan in 2017, up by 9.5 percent on an average annual basis; per capita disposable income increased from 171 yuan to 26,000 yuan nationwide; a total of 740 million Chinese people were lifted out of poverty, bringing the poverty headcount ratio down by 94.4 percentage points, Xi said. He paid tribute to former Party leaders Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, as well as people in all social sectors.

Since the 18th CPC National Congress in November 2012, more than 1,600 reform initiatives have been introduced, Xi added.

"The Chinese nation has achieved a tremendous transformation: it has stood up, grown rich, and is becoming strong," he said proudly.

Tuesday's gathering was presided over by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, also a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee.

Wang Huning, another member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, read a decision to award the personnel who have made outstanding contributions to China's reform and opening-up.