BEIJING, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping in his New Year address promised to make "new strides" on the path of reform and opening up the country.
"In 2013, we made an overall arrangement on comprehensively deepening reform, drawing a grand blueprint for the country's future development," Xi said in his broadcast. "In 2014, we will make new strides along the path of reform."
Xi, who took over as the country's top leader last year, is seen as a reformer and his new team led by Premier Li Keqiang remains committed to reform policies.
At the third party plenum held last November, the country's Communist Party Central Committee acknowledged the market's "decisive role" in shaping the country's economic future and stressed the need to deepen economic reform to ensure the market plays a "decisive" role in allocating resources.
Besides economic reforms, Xi also had been stressing political restructuring, opening up the country and severely cracking down on official corruption seen as a threat to the country's security. The policies adopted at the plenum will guide the country over the next 10 years.
Xi, in his message, said the basic purpose of the reform is to make the country rich and strong, the society fair and just and people's lives better, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.
"We have numerous glories in the name of the great cause of reform and opening-up. I firmly believe that new glories are awaiting the Chinese people," he said. "We welcome a 2014 that is full of hope."
"Let's be modest and discreet, and work hard to jointly compose a new chapter for the development of our great motherland," Xi added.
