Photo: Li Hao/GT

As the world is closely looking to the big upcoming Chinese political event - the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) - with wide international press coverage, the website and social media accounts for the media center of the congress opened on Monday to facilitate the public's access to information about the big event.

To give the public worldwide access to information about the congress, press conferences and press interviews, a website and social media accounts in WeChat, Weibo and Toutiao for the media center opened on Monday. 

The media center, which will handle credentials and interview applications for foreign journalists and journalists from the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions, as well as the island of Taiwan, is scheduled to open on Wednesday. The center will also organize press conferences and arrange coverage of the congress for reporters, the Xinhua News Agency reported.

The website of the media center will fully display the characteristics of the omnimedia era, integrating functions such as authoritative publication, interview services and information inquiry. The website provides bilingual versions in Chinese and English, as well as news reports related to the congress in French, Russian, Arabic and Spanish. Users can also check the list of deputies to the congress, basic information about the CPC and information about previous Party congresses on the website.

For convenience of submitting applications for interviewing the delegates to the 20th CPC National Congress, the press center will launch the interview application system on Wednesday. Due to the impact of COVID-19, the delegates will be available for online and written interviews only.

According to the website of the media center, in order to help journalists from home and abroad get to know more about China with their own eyes, the center will organize a number of visiting and reporting tours for journalists from Wednesday to Friday. 

For example, on Wednesday morning, they will visit an exhibition "Forging Ahead in the New Era" at the Beijing Exhibition Center, which presents the great achievements made by China in various fields since the 18th CPC National Congress. On Wednesday afternoon, they will visit the Central Axis of Beijing and learn about the history of the capital. On Friday afternoon, they will be invited to visit the Beijing New Actuation Fintech Center and the "Rising Financial Technology" exhibition to learn about financial innovation in China.

In October 2017, a total of 3,068 Chinese and foreign journalists have reported on the 19th CPC National Congress, including 1,818 journalists from overseas, setting a record in the history of the Party national congresses, the People's Daily reported. Many of the reporters were from countries along the Belt and Road initiative and BRICS. 

How will the 20th Party National Congress, a major event in the political life of the Party and the state, affect the country and the world? 

A Pakistani media outlet Pakistan Observer wrote on Saturday that the CPC has been playing a "constructive" role in promoting dialogue among civilizations in the world with an open Chinese vision to all, in accordance with the concept of a community with a shared future for mankind. The report noted that "the upcoming 20th National Congress of the CPC has great significance not only for China and its people but also for the rest of the world."

Also, many media outlets such as Singapore's leading newspaper Lianhe Zaobao have launched a special column to cover this big political event.

The chaos of the world and the governance of China - this is the big contrast between the international and domestic backgrounds of the congress. In this context, the certainty that is expected to be brought by the congress, the adherence to the path of peaceful development and further reform and opening-up will inject more stability to China and the world, Chinese experts said.

While details of the upcoming congress are yet to be unveiled, there is no doubt that the congress will be the start of a new journey for China's development and its role in international affairs, analysts said.

China has made outstanding achievements for the world over the past decade, and in the next decade the country will continue to adhere to the principle of peaceful coexistence, be committed to the concept of a community with a shared future for mankind, and closely link its development with the development of the whole world, Yang Xuedong, a professor of political science at Tsinghua University, told the Global Times.

In the past decade, China has shared its achievements and experience of peaceful development with other countries, especially with a large number of developing countries, Yang said. The observer cited the Belt and Road Initiative and the construction of the China-Africa community as examples, noting those are the practices of China's commitment to peaceful development and cooperation. 

Looking back to the achievements of China, the CPC has always made good on its commitments to its people and the world, and this explains why all sides across the world have high expectations for the congress, as well as why the congress will bring certainty to China and the whole world when the international community is undergoing profound changes unseen in a century, Yang said.

"We have been talking about the chaos of the world and the governance of China. This is actually the big contrast between the international and domestic backgrounds of the 20th CPC National Congress," said Zhang Shuhua, director of the Institute of Political Sciences of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

"The upcoming congress will strengthen the stability of Chinese society, and it will also act as a mainstay in the context of a chaotic and confused world as the Chinese road has always been of continuity," said Zhang.

Facing the smears from some Western media outlets on China and the big political event, Zhang responded that the groundless stigmatization by some Western countries, led by the US, exposed that they still refused to accept the fact that China is developing so well. "The more anxious and unconfident the West shows, the more it will gauge the heart of a gentleman with its own mean measure," Zhang said.

But these countries are not representative of the world, and the majority of countries and regions in the world are looking forward to China's development, because this can bring them sustainable help, Zhang said.