AT ITS 10TH SESSION in Beijing on Tuesday, the Standing Committee of the 13th National People's Congress, the nation's top legislature, revised eight laws, including the Law on Judges and the Law on Procurators. ThePaper.cn comments:

It is believed the amendments to the laws on judges and procurators will pave the way for future judicial reform, which will focus on playing up the decisive role of trials in judicial justice and clarifying that judges have lifelong accountability for the cases they handle, while eliminating external interferences with judicial justice, particularly those from government officials.

According to the amendments, judiciaries are required to be more strict and prudent with the appointment, employment, selection and evaluation of judges, laying more emphases on their professionalism and judicial work records. For instance, many judges have been selected from public security and government departments, which will be consigned to the past.

The newly revised law stipulates that the court presidents should have professional knowledge of the law, and relevant work experience related to the law, while vice-presidents and judicial council members, who are directly in charge of reviewing judicial documents and assisting the judges in court, can only be selected from judges, procurators and other staff qualified to work as judges.

Collegiate bench members and judges, rather than the court presidents, will be responsible for reviewing, signing and issuing judicial documents, which is crucial to reducing any external interference in justice.

The amendments, which touch on some acute new problems that have arisen in recent judicial reform, are more specific with the lifelong accountability system for judges, making it workable in practice, and the regulation and restraints of jurisdictions have become more meticulous and rigorous.

The amendments have also laid out more concrete measures to safeguard the personal rights and safety of judges, procurators and other judicial staff handling cases on the front line, as it is not uncommon for their personal safety to be threatened by various parties.

The amendments to these laws show that China's judicial reform is progressing.