Zhou Qiang, president of the Supreme People's Court (SPC), called for more efforts to secure strong judicial support for the work on COVID- 19 epidemic prevention and control.

Zhou made the remarks while presiding over a meeting of the SPC Party organization on March 18.

Zhou pointed out that China has maintained a leading position in the world in economic development and epidemic control since the regular epidemic prevention and control was implemented.

He urged the SPC to fully exert its role of carrying out adjudication, guard against any large-scale rebound of the epidemic, and minimize the impact of the epidemic on socioeconomic development. All courts need to do a solid job to secure people's lives and health and social stability, he said, adding that judgment execution should be strengthened and epidemic-related crimes severely punished.

Judicial measures for the stable development of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises should be well implemented to relieve burdens of various market players caused by the pandemic, Zhou stressed. Judicial guarantees relating to people's livelihoods need to be reinforced to effectively resolve disputes arising from the pandemic in areas such as employment, education, healthcare and elderly care, he said.

Zhou also called for unremitting efforts in regular epidemic prevention and control at courts nationwide, noting that weak links need to be identified and countermeasures improved to eliminate potential risks. Intelligent courts should be given full play, he said, where online-offline integrated judicial services are accessible for the people.