Mobile platform for litigants records big jump

A mobile platform for litigation-related services witnessed a rapid growth of users during the COVID-19 outbreak, playing a bigger role in helping litigants solve their disputes, China's top court said on Thursday.

In March last year, the Supreme People's Court opened a mini program on WeChat, the country's most popular instant messaging tool, in a move to provide litigants with a quicker and easier access to litigation.

People could access legal services, including searching for relevant laws, case filing, case hearing and evidence exchange, after entering the mini program and registering an account on the mobile platform. In other words, people can obtain legal services at any place and any time if they have mobile phones and have installed WeChat.

As of March 31, the platform had more than 1.39 million users and had been visited more than 270 million times, according to a statistic released by the top court on Thursday.

Xu Jianfeng, director of the top court's information center, said the platform is a great achievement of the country's technology-friendly court construction, adding it contributed a lot to helping litigants deal with lawsuits and legal affairs during the outbreak of novel coronavirus pneumonia.

In March, the platform users increased 390,000 and its view reached 2.08 million, up respectively 86.8 percent and 53.7 percent compared with the figures in February, the statistic said.

"Thanks to the platform, litigants' demands during the novel coronavirus epidemic, which required people to reduce travels and face-to-face activities, were met," said Xu Jianfeng, director of the top court's information center.

He added the top court would promote the building of technology-friendly courts to offer more convenience for litigants and improve the quality of legal services.