Keep Up the Fight to Achieve National Rejuvenation*

September 3, 2020

The Communist Party of China and the Chinese people have grown and gained strength in the course of our struggle. Our fighting spirit has been apparent in the whole process of the country's revolution, construction and reform. Our country is now at the critical stage of national rejuvenation, and of reform and opening up. We can expect to encounter all sorts of challenges on the way forward. We must maintain our commitment, step up to the fight, and confront these challenges, whatever difficulties may lie ahead.

We must counter any risks and threats that endanger Party leadership, the socialist system, the sovereignty, security and development interests of our country, our core national interests and principles, the fundamental interests of our people, the realization of the Two Centenary Goals¹, and the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. We must allow ourselves no respite until victory is won.

We will prove that the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is a process that cannot be halted. We, the Chinese people, will never allow any force or any person to impose their will on China, change our course forward, or obstruct our efforts to create a better life.

* Part of the speech at a meeting to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the victory of the Chinese People's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the Global War Against Fascism.

Notes

¹At its 18th National Congress in November 2012, the CPC put forward the Two Centenary Goals for building socialism with Chinese characteristics – to build a moderately prosperous society in all respects by the centenary of the CPC in 2021 and to build China into a modern socialist country by the centenary of the PRC in 2049. At its 19th National Congress in October 2017, the CPC drew up a two-step strategy for the Second Centenary Goal. In the first stage from 2020 to 2035, we will build on the foundations of the moderately prosperous society with a further 15 years of hard work to see that basic socialist modernization is realized. In the second stage from 2035 to the middle of the 21st century, having achieved basic modernization, we will work hard for a further 15 years and develop China into a great modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious, and beautiful. At the ceremony marking the centenary of the CPC on July 1, 2021, General Secretary Xi Jinping declared that China had succeeded in eradicating extreme poverty and achieving the First Centenary Goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, and would move forward towards the Second Centenary Goal of building a modern socialist country.

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