An official with the Ministry of Public Security on Tuesday said China also faces terrorism threats and China would enhance international cooperation on anti-terrorism.

Zhao Yongchen, deputy director of the counter-terrorism bureau of the Ministry of Public Security said, on the eve of the convention of the 22nd Congress on the Law of the World, that terrorism has often occurred in different places of the world over recent years. Terrorism has turned out to be a major threat to world and regional peace, security and stability.

"China also faced up to the realistic and potential threats of terrorism, which mostly came from terrorist activities organized by east Turkistan terrorist forces from home and abroad," said Zhao.

To fight terrorism, the Chinese government will enhance international cooperation and strengthen legislation and law enforcement on anti-terrorism, he said.

To date, China has signed 10 of the 13 international anti-terrorism agreements and China's top legislature has approved two of them.

In 2001, the Standing Committee of the Ninth National People's Congress (NPC) amended the Criminal Law to write some terrorist activities into the list of criminal crimes so as to intensify the crackdown on terrorism.

Zhao said the Chinese government has always held that anti-terrorism work should strictly follow the UN Constitution and the principle of international laws. China upheld a series of anti-terrorism resolutions adopted by the United Nations (UN) and vigorously attended the UN's legislative work on anti-terrorism.

The Chinese government always carefully performed the anti-terrorism duties regulated by the international anti-terrorism agreements and strengthened the regional cooperation on anti-terrorism, including tightening anti-terrorism cooperation with central Asia, southeast Asia as well as some major anti-terrorism countries.

Zhao reiterated the Chinese government's standpoint of anti-terrorism. China opposes any forms of terrorism and every country of the world should not hold double standards when fighting terrorism. The anti-terrorism efforts should help maintain mankind's peace and security and promote the social civilization. China opposes the unreasonable link of terrorism and certain religions and nationality issues.

The 22nd Congress on the Law of the World will be held from Sept. 5 to 10 in Beijing and Shanghai. Anti-terrorism will be one of the 22 special topics of the Congress.

(Xinhua News Agency August 31, 2005)