THE first group of prisoners who were granted special pardons June 29 have been released, according to a statement given to Xinhua on Tuesday.

The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPC), China’s top legislature, adopted a decision granting the special pardons to nine categories of criminals on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on June 29.

A prisoner surnamed Lu received the formal document of the special pardon from a court in Nantong City of East China’s Jiangsu Province on July 21.

Lu was sentenced to four and half years in prison for a traffic accident in 2015. He had been on parole and received community correction since 2018.

“Through the pardon deal, I felt the Party and state’s careful application of penalties and good intent to help us correct ourselves,” said the 51-year-old man who is a veteran of wars to safeguard national sovereignty, security and territorial integrity after the founding of the PRC in 1949, thus making him eligible for the special pardon.

(Xinhua)