Chinese premier stresses audit quality

BEIJING - Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Monday asked the country's auditing bodies to enhance the quality of their work to make more contributions to China's economic and social development.

Wen made the remarks at a national auditing work conference, which was also attended by Vice Premier Li Keqiang.

While acknowledging achievements made by Chinese auditors over the years, Wen urged them, through their auditing work, to help regulate relevant spending to shift the focus toward quality and efficiency, so as to better serve the country's commitment to "scientific development."

Wen said auditing bodies should "reveal in a timely manner, effectively prevent and resolve" various underlying risks in the economy. At the same time, they should strengthen auditing of allocated funds aimed at improving people's livelihood.

To build a clean administration, auditors should perform their duties of supervising the government in accordance with the law, continuing to improve their work mechanism in the process and exposing and punishing illegal behaviors in a timely manner, Wen said.

He also called for local governments and departments to give full support to auditing bodies to let them carry out their work independently.

China's National Audit Office (NAO) last year audited 112 cases of major law violations and economic crimes involving more than 300 people, including some administrative department chiefs.