BEIJING, Dec 18 (Reuters) - China must press forward with market reforms, President Hu Jintao said on Thursday as the Communist-ruled country celebrated 30 years of reforms at a time of deepening economic distress.
Hu told ranks of officials seated in the Great Hall of the People that the country owed its three decades of growth to Deng Xiaoping's reforms that tore away the rigid controls of Mao Zedong's time, gradually opening the economy to private and foreign investment.
China will continue "advancing the cause of reform and opening up", Hu said. "We adhere to focusing on economic development.
"We have constantly expanded opening to the outside, and this has allowed our country to successfully achieve the great historic transformation from a semi-closed one to a fully open one," he said.
His speech celebrated China's success since 1978, when a Party leadership meeting agreed to focus on economic development after decades of turmoil and isolation under Mao.
But the keynote address also comes as that success is under strain from the global economic downturn that has abruptly slowed growth and lifted joblessness, as export-driven factories either curtail production or shut down. (Reporting by Beijing Bureau; Editing by Nick Macfie)