The Shenzhen Daily celebrated its 10th anniversary*, which fell on Sunday, the very day the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region was born, with a grand party at Marco Polo Shenzhen on Thursday.

City leaders including Tang Jie, vice director of the Standing Committee of the Shenzhen People’s Congress, Yan Xiaopei, vice mayor of the Shenzhen Municipal Government, and Huang Guoqiang, deputy secretary general of the Shenzhen Municipal Government, attended the party with nearly 200 expatriates* and Chinese readers.

At the party, Yan said: “The Shenzhen Daily is indispensable* for Shenzhen, which spearheads* China’s reform and opening up and is on its way to becoming an international city.”

“An international city must have an environment where foreigners can communicate and make themselves understood. So in this sense the Shenzhen Daily is a must for Shenzhen,” she added.

“Shenzhen enjoys a good reputation in the world thanks to its rapid urban construction, the numerous multinational companies that have set up offices here, and the global presence of the local companies. Against this background the Shenzhen Daily has become an important channel for communication between Shenzhen and the world, as well as an indispensable part of expatriates’ life here,” said Yan.

Wang Tianliang, editor-in-chief of the Shenzhen Press Group, said at the party that the Shenzhen Daily has played an irreplaceable* role in Shenzhen’s international metropolis* drive and added to the city’s international flavor by covering major international events such as China Hi-Tech Fair, China (Shenzhen) International Cultural Industry Fair and among others.

“Shenzhen Daily’s 10th anniversary is a joyful occasion, not only for the newspaper itself, but also for the press group and Shenzhen. Over the past 10 years, the Shenzhen Daily has made enormous achievements, especially in helping build Shenzhen into an international city,” said Wang.

Hope Riera, a teacher of Shenzhen (Nanshan) International School of Sino-Canada, said on behalf of expatriate readers that the Shenzhen Daily has become an aid for foreigners working and living in the city.

The newspaper received numerous congratulatory messages from a wide range of Chinese and foreign institutions and individuals on its birthday.

The Shenzhen Daily was founded on July 1, 1997 in an era when Shenzhen had set the goal of building itself into an international metropolis. It is the first regional English-language daily newspaper in China and the only English-language daily in South China.