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Top Leaders Attend Funeral of Rong Yiren

The remains of former Chinese Vice-President Rong Yiren were cremated at the Babaoshan Revolutionary Cemetery in Beijing on November 3.

Hu Jintao, China's president and the general secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), bade farewell to the remains of Rong Yiren, who was also officially praised as an "outstanding representative of the national industrial and commercial circles in modern China," a "superb State leader," and a "great fighter for patriotism and communism."

Other senior Party and government leaders attending the funeral included Wu Bangguo, Wen Jiabao, Jia Qinglin, Zeng Qinghong, Huang Ju, Wu Guanzheng, Li Changchun and Luo Gan.

Rong died of disease in Beijing on October 26 at the age of 89. While he was in the hospital and after death, Hu Jintao, Jiang Zemin, Wu Bangguo, Wen Jiabao, Jia Qinglin, Zeng Qinghong, Huang Ju, Wu Guanzheng, Li Changchun, Luo Gan and other senior leaders, as well as former top State leaders, visited Rong and extended condolence in various forms.

Rong's body was covered with a CPC flag and was surrounded by flowers and cypress leaves.

Rong was born to a prestigious family in the country's industrial and commercial circles in Wuxi City, East China's Jiangsu Province, on May 1, 1916. He began helping his father manage flour and textile mills and banking companies in 1937.

In 1949, when the CPC-led armed forces took over Shanghai, China's leading economic center, Rong chose to stay and work with the new government, though the majority of his family members had gone overseas.

Since 1950, Rong had served in a series of important positions, including Shanghai's vice-mayor and vice-minister of textiles, until the catastrophic Cultural Revolutionary (1966-76), during which he suffered a lot.

In 1979, Rong became a strong supporter of the reform, opening and modernization drive initiated by Deng Xiaoping. He founded the China International Trust and Investment Company (CITIC) and became president and general manager of this business flag-carrier of the country.

Among the prestigious positions Rong had held since 1979 were: chairman of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, honorary chairman of the Association of the Relations across the Taiwan Strait, and chairman of the China Association for Peaceful Promotion of the Reunification.

He was vice-chairman of the Standing Committee of the Sixth and Seventh National People's Congresses, and vice-chairman of the Fifth National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.

On July 1, 1985, Rong was admitted into the CPC.

In 1993, Rong was elected vice-president of the People's Republic of China (PRC). He retired in 1998.