Many new faces are showing up in the military delegation to attend China's new parliamentary session, scheduled to kick off here Wednesday.

Among the 268 to represent the country's 2.3-million armed force, 230 are new comers to the National People's Congress (NPC), the country's top legislature, while the others have already served a five-year tenure on the 10th NPC, said the delegation source on Tuesday.

"Compared with the old military deputies, the new ones stand for a wider variety, coming from every section of the armed force, both genders and various ethnic minorities," said the source.

The number of female deputies stands at 22, accounting for 8.2 percent of the total, while 6 percent of the total are ethnic minorities.

New deputies are also more educated than before as 80.6 percent of them are college graduates, 16.4 percent more than five years ago, the source said.

And among them, 77 have a master's degree or higher, up 15.3 percent over five years ago.

"Many experts, including academicians, are among us," the source said, citing Fan Daiming, president of the Fourth Military Medical University and academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, and Li Benqi, commander of the launch of China's first lunar probe Chang'e-1.

About 25.7 percent of deputies come from grass roots, including five soldiers, he said. "This is 2.5 percentage points higher than five years ago."

"Although serving at different posts from different backgrounds, we share the same goal to well exercise the duty of an NPC deputy and contribute to the cause of modern defense," said NPC deputy Cheng Xiaojian, a woman pilot.

(Xinhua News Agency March 4, 2008)