The review and regulatory office of China’s supreme People’s Court revealed a sharp rise in new court cases in China at a national trial and execution analysis conference on Oct 20.

From January to September, courts throughout the country opened approximately 15.13 million new files, up by 20.56 percent year-on-year, 12.39 million of which were litigation files, an increase of 20.16 percent compared with last year.

Zhou Qiang, president of the Supreme People’s Court, said that faced with such conditions, courts at all levels have strengthened trial and execution procedures which are generally going well.

Zhou emphasized that the trial and execution work to be an important focus, as it maintains social stability, promotes social justice and equity and ensures peace and security for the people.

To push forward that work it is necessary to maintain a judicial responsibility system, a supervisory system and an alternative dispute resolution system to reduce the root of the courts’ pressure, the expanding caseload, Zhou said.

He also reaffirmed the need for smart courts and upgrading of information construction to realize deep integration between information technology and trial and execution work.

For example artificial intelligence can provide judges with more smart and efficient services including legal research, similar cases notifications, automatic generation of judgment documents for simple cases and intelligent error-correction of documents, Zhou said.

In this way, judges can be freed from regular repetitive work and concentrate on creative work which requires real judicial intelligence.