Lawmakers Thursday deliberated a draft national intelligence law that contains measures to protect the legal rights and interests of individuals and organizations.

The draft was submitted to the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress for the second reading at the start of its bi-monthly session.

China will protect and honor individuals and organizations who support or coordinate with national intelligence staff, and award those who have made “great contributions” to national intelligence work, it stated.

The draft stipulated that national intelligence agencies and their staff are not allowed to take advantage of their positions to seek personal benefits, and anyone found to have done so will be held accountable in accordance with the law.

In addition, national intelligence agencies should help individuals and organizations report information to intelligence authorities, while those who attempt to deceive (the public) in the name of national intelligence interest may face criminal charges, it said.

A national intelligence law is needed to improve national intelligence work and safeguard national security, lawmakers agreed.

The law was first read and deliberated at the top legislature’s bi-monthly session in December 2016.

President Xi Jinping said more should be done to end poverty and improve the standard of living in revolutionary base areas.

Xi, who is also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, made the remarks during a tour Wednesday of Lyuliang and Xinzhou, two revolutionary base areas in Shanxi Province.

On Wednesday morning, Xi visited Lyuliang revolutionary memorial museum in Xing County of Lyuliang City and left a basket of flowers in a mark of respect for the country’s martyrs, the term used for war heros.

Xi spoke highly of the “Lyuliang spirit” and said it should be used as motivation to “improve people’s lives and to achieve the great rejuvenation of the nation.”

During the tour, Xi spoke about how the poverty relief campaign related to the target of achieving a “moderately prosperous society in an all-round way” by 2020.

Also on Wednesday, Xi visited the village of Zhaojiawa, an impoverished area in Xinzhou City, where he talked with villagers and officials.

Xi spoke of improving living conditions through relocation and called for better supporting measures that would ensure income sources for residents.

The president also met with poverty-relief work teams, and praised their efforts.

Xi said sending officials to serve as first Party committee secretaries at the local level was not only conducive to the poverty eradication campaign, but also improved the competence of officials. He proposed that promising officials at this level should be considered for promotions.

The president vowed continued efforts to improve people’s lives and asked everyone to “roll up sleeves and work harder together with the CPC Central Committee.”

China plans to upgrade its submersible Jiaolong before 2019, scientists said Thursday.

The submersible ended its trial phase last week after completing the country’s 38th and its fourth oceanic scientific expedition, which lasted four months.

It will return to east China’s Qingdao on Friday aboard mothership Xiangyanghong 09.

Jiaolong made dozens of dives during the expedition and descended to nearly 6,700 meters in the Yap Trench in the west Pacific, close to its record depth of 7,062 meters in 2012.

Scientists observed and photographed large marine creatures and the seabed, and collected seawater, rocks and samples of marine life from the deep sea.

The 39-year-old Xiangyanghong 09 is also set to retire after carrying Jiaolong for hundreds of dives since 2009.

A new mothership for Jiaolong is under construction, and is scheduled to be launched around the end of 2018.

The two-day conference highlighting gender inequality led by the U.N. Women Beijing Office opened on June 21, in the capital of China.

The need for the conference was highlighted after a case where financial relief was given to Chinese women in impoverished rural areas in order to purchase sanitary napkins and medicines to treat and prevent vaginitis. Many of the beneficiaries of the program spent none of the money on themselves, but rather on their husbands and sons. They thought it is necessary as their husbands play a supportive role in the family and the money would be better distributed to the husband to have a pack of cigarettes. The children may need simple necessities such as a backpack, recalled Professor Liu Bohong from China Women’s University.

Liu told the story during a panel discussion at the International Conference on Gender Equality and Philanthropy hosted by the U.N. Women Beijing Office from June 21 to 22.

The conference welcomed over 100 guests including social gender experts, representatives of international organizations and executives for philanthropic funds. The conference discussed the problem of how social gender inequality can be incorporated into international standards of philanthropic development including in China. The challenges facing the allocation of philanthropic funds and the mechanisms for donation and how these can be improved were also discussed.

“We can’t make our donations work if social gender disparity remains ignored,” Liu said.

To facilitate the implementation of gender equality, Julie Brousssard, the country program manager of U.N. Women, underscored the importance of strategic philanthropy.

“In terms of philanthropic commitments, international experience has shown that we need to strive for strategic philanthropy. This is the only way to effectively address the needs of the most vulnerable and the most marginalized,” said Broussard.

Elizabeth Knup, the representative of the Beijing Office, Ford Foundation, echoed Broussard, saying that gender equality cannot be achieved without scrupulous gender analysis and gender planning.

“For whatever projects we fund we need to have an understanding of the affected people of different genders,” she said while addressing the conference.

According to Heather Grady, the vice president of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, philanthropic undertakings can be divided into institutional, corporate and internet categories — out of which internet philanthropy is growing fastest in China.

Tong Dawei, a renowned actor and U.N. Women Goodwill Ambassador, called on people to change their stubborn minds on gender issues, in particular in relation to the subconscious mindset that men are superior to women.

“In Chinese schools we often believe in the misinterpretation which entails that, although girls are outdoing boys in junior middle school, they will be eventually surpassed by boys in high school, implying a minor but deep rooted discrimination,” Tong said.

People need to be actively aware of gender inequality in everyday life such as to make sure that boys and girls can pursue equal access to whatever they are interested in regardless of gender differences, he added.

Three panda cubs were born in northwest China’s Shaanxi Province last week, the provincial forestry department said Thursday.

Fourteen-year-old Yang Yang gave birth to a male cub on June 11 at Shaanxi Rare Wild Animals Rescue and Breeding Research Center. As of Wednesday, the cub weighed 320 grams.

Another panda at the center, Ai Bang, gave birth to twin male cubs on June 12. The weight of each cub has already surpassed 230 grams.

Ma Qingyi, vet at the center, said neither Yang Yang nor Ai Bang are first time mothers so they are both experienced in taking care of their cubs. The three cubs are all in good conditions.

Ma said two other female pandas at the center are expected to deliver soon.

There are currently 22 captive giant pandas and 345 wild pandas in Shaanxi. The wild pandas’ habitats cover more than 360,000 hectares and have been significantly expanded, according to statistics from the provincial forestry department.

Giant pandas are one of the world’s most endangered species and live mainly in the mountains of northern Sichuan Province as well as southern Gansu and Shaanxi provinces. A national survey released in February 2015 showed that as of the end of 2013, China had 1,864 wild pandas and 375 living in captivity.