President Xi Jinping has stressed the importance of protecting and utilizing cultural relics of revolutionary times in inspiring people throughout the country to build China into a modern socialist country and realize national rejuvenation.

Xi, who is also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remark in a recent instruction. Vice-Premier Sun Chunlan read the instruction on Tuesday at a national conference for work related to cultural relics of revolutionary times in Beijing.

Xi said in the written instruction that cultural relics of revolutionary times have great relevance to the glorious past of the Party and the people in heroic struggles and record the great history and moving deeds of the Chinese revolution.

They are treasures of the Party and the country, and also "vivid textbooks" for carrying forward revolutionary traditions and cultures, strengthening the building of a socialist society with an advanced culture and ideology, inspiring patriotic enthusiasm and invigorating national pride, he added.

Xi called for better protection and use of cultural relics of revolutionary times, carrying forward revolutionary culture and passing on the "red revolutionary gene". He said the tasks are a common responsibility of the Party and the whole of society.

He urged Party committees and governments at various levels to put related work in an important place on their agenda for better protection, management and use of those cultural relics and allow them to play an important role in the learning of Party history, revolutionary traditions and patriotic education.

Speaking at the conference, Huang Kunming, a member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and head of the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, said Xi's instruction fully explains the significance, objectives, tasks and requirements of the work related to cultural relics of revolutionary times.

It demonstrates the great importance that the CPC Central Committee with Xi at the core gives to the work related to such cultural relics and constitutes the fundamental guideline for related work in the new era, Huang said.

He also stressed the need to implement Xi's instruction to advance work related to such cultural relics.