2016年CRI 45th anniversary since People's Republic of China took up its lawful seat in United Nations（在线收听）

The UN General Assembly voted to pass a resolution on October 25th, 1971, recognizing the Chinese mainland as the only legitimate representative of China to the UN.

At the same time, the resolution expelled representatives from Taiwan, which had been representing China for some 25 years by then.

Chinese deputy foreign minister Li Baodong says the move was significant not only for China, but for the UN as well.

"The resolution opened up a new chapter in China's cooperation with the UN. After that, the UN became an international institution with paramount authority, and it started to represent the widest range of interests. As was pointed out by the resolution itself, the restoration of the lawful status of People's Republic of China in the UN was an indispensable step when it comes to preserving the integrity of the UN Charter, as well as pushing forward UN causes."

Over the past four decades, China has lifted more than 700-million people out of poverty, accounting for some 70-percent of the world's total.

More than 30-thousand Chinese soldiers have been deployed to UN peacekeeping missions across the world since 1990, with more than 10 losing their lives while on duty.

The UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, including 17 development goals for human society, was passed by world leaders attending a UN summit last September.

Zhang Dan, vice president of UN Association of China, a Chinese organization focusing on the China-UN ties, says China is perhaps more committed than anyone else to the agenda.

"China played a core role in the designing of the agenda. For instance, poverty alleviation, which is stated as the first goal in the agenda, has always been China's priority. There are many other goals where you can see Chinese influence. Actually, all goals in the agenda bear many similarities with China's own 13th five-year plan for social and economic development. So long as China sticks to its own plan, it will end up contributing significantly to the 2030 agenda."

Jeffrey Feltman, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, echoed Zhang's words.

"The agenda's implementation requires robust political leadership, which China has already shown. It was China's championship of sustainable development that solves the G20 adopt an action plan on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The first time that sustainable development was incorporated into the G20 growth agenda."

Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping said peace and development are the themes of today's world as early as the 1980s.

In one editorial commemorating the day 45 years ago, People's Daily, the official newspaper of the Communist Party of China, says the country will remain committed to these two themes.

For CRI, this is Ding Heng.