Diplomats in Geneva applaud China's whole-process people's democracy

GENEVA, Dec. 7 (Xinhua) -- A group of Geneva-based diplomats on Tuesday applauded the launching of a report titled "Pursuing Common Values of Humanity -- China's Approach to Democracy, Freedom and Human Rights," saying that China's people-centered whole-process people's democracy should be appreciated.

The report, conducted by New China Research (NCR), the think tank of China's Xinhua News Agency, was officially released Tuesday in Beijing and Geneva via video link.

Speaking at the launch event of the report, Stuart Harold Comberbach, permanent representative of Zimbabwe to the United Nations (UN) Office at Geneva, said that the voices of the people of China are "more heard and listened to" in the formulation of national policy and in the making of major decisions.

The report provided clear proof of the success and efficacy of China's own model, its own template for people-centered democracy, people-centered development, and people-centered progress, the Zimbabwean envoy said.

He stressed that while some Western nations insist on the supremacy of their model of democracy and development, there are examples in history of how political and economic reform agendas insisted on by Western countries have served to destabilize countries, to further undermine already fragile economies and to provoke social unrest.

"If the Greek words Demos Kratia, which have given us the English word democracy, translate as the power of the people, then clearly, the Chinese model is far closer to both the spirit and letter of that ancient concept than any modern Western variant," he said.

Li Song, deputy permanent representative to the UN Office at Geneva, stated that while some countries attempt to reverse history by convening the so-called "Democracy Summit" to bring the world back to the Cold War era, it provided the international community with an opportunity to re-think the true meaning of democracy.

Many diplomats in Geneva, said Li Song, have recently stated that there is no single democratic model in the world, and that countries have the right to pick a political system and development path that best suits their own national circumstances.

Lisandra Astiasaran Arias, counsellor of the permanent mission of Cuba to the UN Office at Geneva, said that there is no simple model or definition of democracy, and every state has the right and the responsibility to develop its own models in accordance with its particular situation and the will of its own people.

"We should not allow the attempts of some countries to impose their views on democracy and human rights on the rest of the world," she said.

According to the NCR report, a well-functioning democracy can guarantee and develop freedom and human rights, and can realize the unification of process and results-based democracy, procedural democracy and substantive democracy, direct democracy and indirect democracy, as well as people's democracy and state will.