BEIJING — Chinese President Xi Jinping called on the ruling Communist Party to adapt to changing circumstances while safeguarding the country’s achievements on Wednesday, urging members to confront emerging risks and strengthen party discipline as China marked the 105th anniversary of the party’s founding.
Speaking for about 40 minutes at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, Xi said China faced a period in which strategic opportunities coexisted with growing risks and challenges, requiring stronger coordination to address both domestic and international issues.
“China’s development is currently in a period where strategic opportunities, and risks and challenges, coexist,” Xi said, without identifying specific threats or opportunities.
Xi urged party officials to improve coordination in responding to increasingly complex issues while ensuring the Communist Party remained capable of guiding China’s long-term development.
Although Xi did not elaborate on the country’s immediate priorities, analysts have identified slowing economic growth, demographic decline and mounting geopolitical tensions as some of the most significant challenges confronting China.
Beijing also continues to face external pressure from Western restrictions on advanced technology exports, strained trade relations with the United States and heightened tensions surrounding Taiwan, prompting the leadership to reinforce the party’s influence across all sectors of society.
Founded in 1921 by a small group of revolutionaries, the Communist Party now says it has more than 100 million members, representing about 7.2% of China’s population.
State news agency Xinhua said this week the party now seeks to evolve from the world’s largest political party into its most powerful political party, reflecting Beijing’s ambitions to strengthen both domestic governance and international influence.
Xi also stressed the importance of maintaining ideological discipline within the party, calling on members to eliminate practices that could undermine its effectiveness and integrity.
He urged officials to remove “all viruses that erode the party’s healthy body” and eliminate factors harmful to the party’s advancement and “purity.”
Since assuming power in 2012, Xi has consolidated the Communist Party’s authority through a broad campaign emphasizing political loyalty, centralized leadership and internal discipline while expanding China’s global influence.
His anti-corruption campaign, one of the largest since the era of Mao Zedong, has led to investigations involving millions of officials and the removal of hundreds of senior party leaders, military commanders and government officials accused of corruption or disciplinary violations.
