Legal, self-supervision

Born in Shanghai in 1955, Cao once worked in a restaurant.

In 1979, he was admitted to the Shanghai-based East China College of Political Science and Law, now known as the East China University of Political Science and Law, and majored in law.

In 1986, he received a master's degree in law.

After graduating, he stayed at the college and served successively as a lecturer, department head, executive vice-president and president of the college.

Cao started to study China's reform and development from the perspective of law during his postgraduate studies, which helped him make a name for himself in academia.

As of 1994, the CPC Central Committee had started to hold law-studying lectures for its Political Bureau members. Cao, then 39 years old, gave the first lecture.

He lectured on the international business and trade law system and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, which drew wide attention both inside and outside of China.

In 1998, he gave the top leadership another lecture on financial security and the construction of the legal system.

Delivered against the backdrop of the Asian financial crisis, the lecture was highly valued and followed by a raft of legal measures aimed at maintaining financial security and warding off financial risks.

In 1999, Cao left for Beijing to assume the post of vice president of the Supreme People's Court and concurrently that of president of the National Judges College.

In 2008, he was elected procurator-general of the Supreme People's Procuratorate, China's chief prosecuting body.

Since being elected procurator-general, Cao has explicitly required procuratorates to intensify legal supervision, self-supervision and personnel development.

Under his leadership, procuratorates nationwide have adopted a string of new measures to serve economic development and enhance people's livelihoods.

In some major fields, procuratorates have staged a series of legal supervision campaigns, fought crime that could compromise food and drug safety and strengthened investigations into duty-related crimes.

As a jurist, Cao attaches much importance to the supervisory nature of procuratorial work, stressing that the principle of the rule of law should be embodied and judicial rules should be obeyed.

He has also called on supervisors to consciously subject themselves to supervision, as well as stated that intensifying self-supervision is equally important as strengthening legal supervision.

Procuratorates have started recording and videotaping interrogations for suspects involved in duty-related crimes, and transferred the power to approve arrests in such cases to procuratorates at the next higher level.

Procuratorates have also centralized case management and addressed their own violations of laws and rules while handling cases.

These moves have further standardized law enforcement and improved the image of law executors.

Public expectations

China's legal circle expects much from Zhou and Cao, both professionally trained.

It is hoped that in future reforms in the justice system, courts and procuratorates will continue to reinforce judicial authority and cultivate highly-qualified judges and procurators, said Liu Hongyu, a lawyer and member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the top political advisory body.

Liu said he also expects courts and procuratorates to further protect the rights of litigants and lawyers, make trials for major and influential cases public and subject themselves to public supervision.