China VP promoted as party pledges political reform

China's Communists promoted Vice President Xi Jinping to a key position seen as a vital step in his ascent to the top job and pledged to pursue political reform as they wrapped up an annual meeting Monday.

Party leaders also said at the conclusion of the four-day plenum that they would continue to pursue "relatively fast" economic growth and promote peace with self-ruled Taiwan, while still favouring the country's "reunification".

Xi, 57, was named vice chairman of the Central Military Commission, which under current politics makes him the likely successor to Hu Jintao, who is due to step down as party chief in 2012 and as China's president in 2013.

Xi -- the son of a revolutionary hero -- was promoted to the powerful nine-member standing committee of the party's political bureau in 2007 and was named China's vice president the following year.

Analysts say the announcement of Xi's appointment is important partly because the commission serves as China's most potent tool of political power.

"The Communist Party still follows the old Mao Zedong tradition that 'the power comes from the barrel of the gun'," Willy Lam, a political analyst at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, told AFP.

"Now that Xi Jinping has become the vice chairman, his succession is secured. That means he definitely without a doubt will become the (party) general secretary in 2012... and then state president in March 2013."

The plenum of roughly 300 top party members vowed to "actively and safely advance" the process of political reform -- an issue that has been in the global spotlight since jailed dissident Liu Xiaobo won the Nobel Peace Prize.

Communist leaders also stressed that they would be the "fundamental guarantee" for the nation's development over the next five years, according to a statement released by Xinhua news agency.

The reaffirmation of the party's supremacy follows several high-profile and unusual calls for political reform last week ahead of the plenum.

On Friday, when the meeting began, more than 100 Chinese scholars, activists and lawyers signed a letter calling for democracy and the release of Nobel laureate Liu along with all other political prisoners.

As of Sunday night, the number of signatories had jumped to more than 600.

And in a separate appeal earlier in the week, 23 former communist officials and media leaders issued their own bluntly worded open letter to the government calling for freedom of expression to be protected.

Even Premier Wen Jiabao has waded into the fray, saying this month in an interview with CNN that calls for "democracy and freedom will become irresistible", echoing remarks he made in an August speech.

On the economic front, party leaders concluded that the next five years would be a "critical stage for China to build a moderately prosperous society", underlining concerns about the wealth gap between rich and poor.

They also said they hoped to achieve a "major breakthrough in economic restructuring" as policymakers maintain measures aimed at boosting domestic demand.

Beijing has pledged to restructure the economy to make it less reliant on exports and investment and, instead, make domestic consumption a bigger driver of growth.

China is now the world's second-largest economy, having overtaken Japan in the second quarter of this year.

On Thursday, the government will release key data that is expected to show economic growth continued to slow in the third quarter, as Beijing stepped up efforts to rein in property prices and curb bank lending.

After a blistering 11.9 percent increase in the first three months of 2010, growth slowed to 10.3 percent in the second quarter and most economists expect to see growth in the high single-digits in the third quarter.