Zhou Qiang, president of the Supreme People's Court (SPC), stressed at a seminar of high people's courts' presidents the construction of a one-stop diversified dispute resolution mechanism and litigation service system.

The seminar was held between Sept 1 to 2, during which reports on construction of a one-stop diversified dispute resolution mechanism and litigation service system by 31 high courts and one foreign-related court were made by video conference.

The high people's courts of 31 provincial-level regions and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps reported the construction of diversified dispute resolution mechanism through vido link at the seminar.

The mechanism plays a significant role in improving courts' capacity for dispute settlement and serving the people in the new era, as it promotes a modern trial system and capacity and improves the socialists judicial system with Chinese characteristics.

For the past year, courts nationwide were in full swing in building a one-stop diversified dispute resolution mechanism into an intensified and highly-efficient, open and interactive, smart and accurate and integrated and sharable platform.

At present, effectiveness of diversified dispute resolution mechanism and assistant trial function are greatly improved, as well as its effect in guaranteeing the epidemic prevention and control.

At the seminar, courts were required to strengthen comprehensive governance of the diversified dispute resolution mechanism at its roots in accordance with law, highly value the non-litigation dispute settlement approach and deepen judicial reform and smart court construction so as to provide fair, convenient, smart and accurate services for the public that lead to a higher level of justice and fairness.

Current and upcoming overall one-stop mechanism construction will focus on serving regular prevention and control of the COVID-19 epidemic and economic and social development as well as enforcement and functional orientation of social governance and will center on one-stop online service, intensification, integration and convergence.

The courts should enhance precaution and settlement of disputes from the beginning, optimize joint resolution of severe disputes, improve work related to complaints in the form of letters and petitions through online appeals and promote online and offline connection between non-litigation and litigation to shorten and simplify settlement periods and procedures.

The seminar also urged making full use of integrated mediation platforms to improve dispute settlement efficiency and promote the one-stop dispute settlement function of the litigation service centers by setting up special mediation zones integrating services like litigation guiding, self-service assessment, diversified dispute resolutio, fast-track trial and legal aid.

What's more, the method of seperating simple cases from the complicated one and diversified dispute resolution mechanism should be effective connected to simplify and quicken dispute settlement.

Pushing forward online dispute settlement and modern smart litigation service is a key to online platform construction. The seminar pointed out the desirability of building an integrated online litigation service platform, putting all offline services there and improving online service accuracy.

Assistant trial work should also go online and include deepening synchronous generations of electric judgements.

In addition, inconvenience in litigation caused by location should be overcome by a system promoting cross-regional remote trials covering all regions by the end of this year.

The seminar also encouraged courts to improve big data analysis capacity and adopt online-offline methods by using circuit courts and online litigation to make people feel the justice of the proceedings and results.

The seminar set a goal of completing a basic one-stop diversified dispute resolution mechanism and litigation system and realizing online case filing, mediation and judgment delivery in early 2021.

Also by that time, all courts should be making full use of the mediation platform and providing a cross-regional filing service. More than 60 percent of civil and commercial cases of first instance should then be settled through mediation.

Courts must support regular prevention and control of the epidmeic and economic and social development, strengthen judicial protection of property rights and entrepreneurs' rights and interests as well as protect and stimulate main market entities' vigor so as to serve stability in employment, financial operations, foreign trade, foreign investment, domestic investment and expectations as well as security in employment, basic living needs, operations of market entities, food and energy, stable industrial and supply chains, and the normal functioning of primary-level government.

They should also firmly maintain national political security and overall social stability, stridently punish all kinds of crimes in accordance with the law and promote trial and enforcement in gang-related cases to build a safe China.

Implementation of the Civil Code, trial and enforcement of epidemic-related cases, deepening judicial reform and smart court construction were also emphasized at the seminar.