BEIJING, March 10 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese courts meted out guilty verdicts to six ministerial public servants in 2003, Xiao Yang, president of the Supreme People's Court, said here Wednesday.

    During his work report of the Supreme People's Court to the ongoing Second session of the 10th National People's Congress (NPC), he said 73 prefecture-level officials and 458 county-level officials were put on trials and convicted.

    "The Supreme People's Court supports and respects the independent and fair trial of cases by local courts at various levels last year, and enhanced supervision and guidance of their work," said the president.

    He noted that local courts also handed down verdicts to a total of 5.687905 million cases of various kinds last year, involving 768.5 billion yuan (93.7 billion US dollars), up 0.78 percent and 8.33 percent year-on-year, respectively.

    Verdicts were passed last year on a total of 735,535 criminal cases by local courts, giving guilty verdicts to 933,967 defendants, up 1.21 percent and 1.51 percent, respectively, according to the report.

    Of the criminal cases, 238,949 ones pertained to arson, blast, murder, kidnapping, robbery, mafia-like organized crimes and otheroffenses, and 308,183 accused were convicted, he said.

    Chinese courts also concluded over 37,580 cases involving violation of the rights of minors and women with 40,820 people given guilty verdicts, said Xiao.

    A total of 19,197 people were sentenced last year as Chinese courts concluded 14,775 cases concerning production and marketing of fake and shoddy goods, smuggling and financial fraud, said the president.

    On human rights protection involved in the judicial field, Chinese courts gave not-guilty verdicts to 2,467 defendants charged with criminal offences, to 2,368 defendants charged by public prosecutors according to the report.

    Xiao said the Supreme People's Court passed verdicts on 300 cases of death penalty examination and retrials of criminal cases,up 16.28 percent over the previous year.

    The Supreme People's Court also ruled on 372 civil cases of appeals and cases of business disputes concerning foreign firms orcitizens with 13.48 billion yuan involved, he said.

    Courts at local levels delivered verdicts on 114,896 lawsuits against government departments and institutions, involving urban housing resettlement, expropriation of rural farmland and social security, and ruled on 3,124 State compensation cases, a rise of 18.24 percent over the same period of last year.

    Courts across China rescinded rulings on 5,805 verdicts, which had been proven to inaccurate in evidence, not strict with trial proceedings, or unfair in their verdicts. Enditem