Chinese Vice-President Zeng Qinghong made a study tour in Changsha County in central China's Hunan Province between February 3 and February 6, stressing the importance of building socialist new countryside.

Zeng, also a Standing Committee member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, went there to monitor the ongoing campaign of maintaining the progressiveness of CPC members in rural areas.

During his stay, Zeng visited villages and had dinners with villagers. He urged local officials and CPC members to take the lead in boosting rural economy to achieve prosperity and harmony in the countryside.

His trip coincided with the Spring Festival, the beginning of traditional Chinese Lunar New Year.

Zeng also visited the ancestral home of Hu Yaobang, late leader of the CPC Central Committee, and the tomb of Yang Kaihui, the wife of late Chinese leader Mao Zedong. In addition, he went to some other memorial sites related to China's Democratic Revolution which began in 1911, when the last feudal Qing Dynasty was toppled.

(Xinhua News Agency February 7, 2006)