Religion will outlast class and country, says Jiang

President Jiang Zemin believes religion will outlast countries and class systems, one of China's top religious officials said yesterday.

During a tour of his new offices in Beijing, Wang Zuoan, deputy director-general of the State Administration for Religious Affairs, quoted Mr Jiang as saying religion was powerful and long-lasting.

'While class and country may be abolished, religion will survive,' he quoted the President as saying. Because of this, Mr Wang said, the Government must face reality.

'Our religious policy will be more and more open. The issue of religion and human rights is the same. We encourage religion and are against sects, such as Falun Gong,' he said.

On the issue of relations with the Vatican, Mr Wang repeated Beijing's long-standing conditions for normalising relations - that the Vatican recognise 'one China' and break its ties with Taiwan. 'The Vatican says that it is willing to restore relations but wants through this to interfere in our internal affairs and train underground hostile forces that oppose the Government and official Catholics,' he said.

Beijing was enraged when the Vatican chose October 1 - China's National Day - to canonise 120 Chinese and foreign saints in 2000.