China's top legislature adopted a change to the law on the country's court system on Tuesday requiring all death sentences to be approved by the country's Supreme People's Court.

The amendment to the country's organic law on the people's court will come into effect on Jan. 1, 2007. It is believed to be the most important reform on capital punishment in China in more than 20 years.

The amendment deprives the provincial people's courts of the final say on issuing death sentence, saying that death penalties handed out by provincial courts must be reviewed and ratified by the Supreme People's Court (SPC).

Xiao Yang, president of the Supreme People's Court, said such a change separates the review of death sentence from the second instance hearings of death sentence cases, which is "an important procedural step to prevent wrongful convictions."

"It will also give the defendants in death sentence cases one more chance to have their opinions heard," Xiao said.

(Xinhua News Agency October 31, 2006)