The State Council on July 7 issued opinions calling on administrative departments to strengthen and improve their responses to litigation cases.

The new opinions are aimed at improving administrative departments’ active and timely responses to litigation cases in court, supporting the courts’ acceptance of administrative litigation cases, as well as respecting and implementing the effective judgments of the courts.

Administrative litigations are an important legal system for resolving administrative disputes, protecting the legal rights of citizens, legal persons and other organizations, as well as supervising the power exercise of administrative departments. It is also the statutory duty of the administrative departments to properly respond to such cases, according to the State Council opinions.

The opinions urged administrative departments to respect case registration and filings from the people’s courts at all levels, actively support them in safeguarding the prosecution rights of citizens, legal persons and other organizations, as well as to accept their supervision in accordance with the Administrative Procedure Law.

The sued administrative departments should submit sufficient pleadings and evidences to the people’s courts, actively respond to lawsuits in courts, and conscientiously perform the effective rulings, decisions and meditation made by the people’s courts, according to the opinions. And the responsible persons of the sued administrative departments should be familiar with laws, case fact and evidences, and support the people’s courts during investigations.

The opinions also urged administrative departments to continuously regulate their conducts and improve their capability to prevent and resolve administrative disputes at the source.

Efforts are also required to strengthen the evaluation of administrative departments’ responses to litigation cases, according to the opinions.