CNR:

China's total number of motor vehicles and length of roads open to traffics already rank first in the world. How is our country's current road traffic safety? Has there been any change in our country's road traffic safety index in recent years? Thank you.

Sun Maoli:

Thank you. Road traffic safety is important to millions of families. We have done a lot of work and achieved good results. I'd like to invite Mr. Li Jiangping, director of the ministry's traffic management bureau, to answer these questions.

Li Jiangping:

Thank you for your questions. Since the 18th CPC National Congress, the public security organs across China have adhered to putting people and their lives first and closely focused on the principles of preventing accidents, ensuring safety, and smooth traffic, and have done our best to ensure the continuous and steady improvement in road traffic safety. By the end of June, China has seen the motor vehicle ownership and the number of drivers reaching 406 million and 492 million respectively, with an increase of 160 million in the former and 227 million in the latter compared with 2012. The various indicators of road traffic safety continued to improve. The number of major traffic accidents dropped from 25 in 2012 to four in 2021, with no serious traffic accidents for 33 consecutive months. The number of traffic accidents involving three or more deaths has declined 59.3%. First, we strengthened top-level design. We submitted the opinions on strengthening road traffic safety to the State Council for them to be issued and issued the 12th and 13th Five-Year Plans for road traffic safety. We will also release the 14th Five-Year Plan for road traffic safety to implement road traffic safety tasks and major projects in an orderly manner. Second, we improved the legal and institutional system. We promoted law-based governance; established a system of laws, regulations and technical standards with the road traffic safety law being the most important part of it; and pushed serious traffic violations such as drunk driving to be integrated into the scope of criminal law. Third, we strengthened risk prevention and control at the source. We promoted the implementation of highway safety and life protection projects and had nearly 700,000 kilometers of dangerous roads treated. We continued to tackle the potential risks regarding four types of vehicles, namely tourist charter buses, shuttle buses to and from nonadjacent counties or covering even longer distance, special vehicles conveying dangerous cargoes, and heavy trucks, and joined with relevant departments to tackle the illegal refitting, gauge-exceeding and overloading of freight cars. We strictly managed the order of road traffic and investigated and severely punished traffic violations that were prone to cause accidents and troubles. Fourth, we strengthened foundational work at the primary level. We improved the rural traffic management mechanism with the principle of "led by the county, managed in the township, and extended to the village." We made efforts to establish traffic control stations and traffic safety persuasion stations and station traffic safety officers and traffic safety assistants in rural areas. We upgraded and remodeled the public security traffic management platform, strengthened the construction and application of the highway traffic safety prevention and control system, and promoted the transformation and upgrading of traffic management to be more IT-based and smarter. Fifth, we continued to strengthen publicity and education on traffic safety. We pushed the designation of December 2 every year as "National Traffic Safety Day" to raise the public's awareness of traffic safety. We also comprehensively popularized an internet service platform and a mobile application for traffic management, which provided an average of 331 million safety warnings and critical business tips for drivers point-to-point every year.

At present, China's road traffic safety faces many new situations and problems, with plenty of security risks and hidden dangers. Next, public security organs across the country will focus on the prevention of road traffic accidents by reducing the volume of traffic accidents and controlling the occurrence of major traffic accidents, and launch a 100-day campaign to address prominent traffic violations in the summer to create a safer and smoother road traffic environment for people to travel. Thank you.