The year 2004 saw more than 2.41 million Chinese joining the Communist Party of China (CPC) in 2004, including 894 private entrepreneurs, a senior CPC official said on Thursday in Beijing.

Li Jingtian, deputy head of the CPC Central Committee's Organization Department, said at a press conference that the Communist Party of China is not only the vanguard of the Chinese working class, but the vanguard of the whole Chinese nation and all Chinese people. The CPC party member team is mainly comprised by workers, farmers, intellectuals, service men and women, and governmental officials.

The CPC also welcome advanced private entrepreneurs to join the CPC, so as to extend and consolidate the CPC's foundation among the people, Li said.

In 2004, 17.38 million Chinese applied to join the CPC, 1.357 million or 8.5 percent more than the figure of the previous year.

In the same year, 2.418 million Chinese joined the CPC, 183,000 or 8.2 percent more than the figure of the previous year.

Currently, China has more than 69 million CPC party members in 3.4 million CPC grass-root units.

Source: Xinhua