BEIJING — More than 100,000 military and civilian participants gathered at the heart of Beijing on the morning of Oct 1, ready for a military parade and a mass pageantry to celebrate the 70th founding anniversary of the People's Republic of China (PRC).

Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, Chinese President, and chairman of the Central Military Commission, will deliver an important speech.

The scale of the parade will be greater than the ones marking the 50th and 60th founding anniversaries of the PRC, as well as the V-Day military parade in 2015, according to Cai Zhijun, deputy head of the office of the leading group for the military parade.

The parade is expected to showcase China's achievements in building its national defense and armed forces in the past 70 years and reflect the outcomes of the recent reform of the people's armed forces, according to Cai.