Women membership in the Communist Party of China (CPC) reached 12.956 million in 2004, accounting for 18.6 percent of all CPC members, an increase of 3 percentage points over 1995, says a white paper on gender equality and women's development.

Women accounted for 18 percent of all delegates to the 16th CPC National Congress held in 2002, an increase of 1.2 percentage points over the previous congress, says the white paper, issued by the Information Office of the State Council on Wednesday.

Of the members of the 16th CPC Central Committee, 7.6 percent are women (as either members or alternate members), an increase of 0.3 percentage points from the previous congress, it says.

Meanwhile, women membership is relatively high in the eight democratic parties, exceeding 30 percent in seven of them.

At present, four of the vice-chairpersons of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the top advisory body of the country, are women.

Source: Xinhua