Chinese President Hu Jintao said in Beijing Wednesday that children of all ethnic groups in China should study hard, life happily and work for all-round development.

Chinese President Hu Jintao (L) shakes hands with a delegate to the Fifth National Congress of the Chinese Young Pioneers during his meeting with delegates in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on June 1, 2005.

Hu and other Chinese leaders met with 790 delegates attended the Fifth National Congress of the Chinese Young Pioneers (CYP), which opened here in Beijing Wednesday, or the International Children's Day.

Founded by the Communist Party of China (CPC) in 1950 and run by the Communist Youth League, CYP is China's largest organization of children that serves to recruit all the children between 7 and 14. It currently boasts 130 million members across the country.

Top Chinese leaders Wu Bangguo, Wen Jiabao, Jia Qinglin, Zeng Qinghong, Huang Ju, Wu Guanzheng, Li Changchun and Luo Gan also met with the delegates before the opening of the congress, expressing their congratulations and extending greetings to the children across the country.

"I just come here to extend my festival greetings to you all and to all the children nationwide," said Chinese President Hu Jintao.

Surrounded by the vivacious kids, Hu appeared to be very cheerful.

"Let's just upgrade the roads in your hometown so that more little kids can travel to Lhasa, and even Beijing?" Hu told Losang Qoinjor, a kid from Tibet after knowing that it took three day for Losang to travel from Ali to Lhasa, the regional capital. Losang returned Tibetan greeting on behalf of all children in Tibet.

Hu also told Li Kun, who wears a pair of glasses, not to read books when lying on bed or watching computers too long. Li thanked Hu's care.

The congress opened at 9:30 and Wang Zhaoguo, a member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, extended festival congratulations to Chinese children on behalf of the CPC Central Committee.

"The rejuvenation of the Chinese nation depends on the unremitting struggle of all Chinese for generations to come and such a cause will definitely and eventually be passed to the hands of the children nowadays," said Wang.

He urged the children nationwide to actively get adapted to the development need of the time. Moreover, he called on the CYS branches to give play to their advantages so as to foster future builders and successors.

He also asked children to start from their love to the hometown, parents, teachers and students to the cultivation of their virtues of devoting themselves to the motherland, society and people.

Also present were senior Chinese officials from various CPC and governmental departments.

Source: Xinhua