49. Underlines the potential consequences of the proposed social credit system for the business environment, and calls for its implementation in a transparent, fair and equitable manner; 50. Welcomes the legislative progress in the EU on Regulation (EU) 2017/821 on supply chain due diligence obligations for Union importers of tin, tantalum and tungsten, their ores, and gold originating from conflict-affected and high-risk areas, and similar conflict minerals legislation in China aimed at ensuring that the trade in these minerals does not finance armed conflict; emphasises the need to prevent conflict minerals from being processed in our mobile phones, cars and jewellery; calls on both the Commission and the Chinese Government to set up structured cooperation to support the implementation of the new legislation and to effectively prevent global, Chinese and EU smelters and refiners from using conflict minerals, to protect mine workers, including children, from being abused, and to require EU and Chinese companies to ensure that they import these minerals and metals from responsible sources only; 51. Notes that at the 19th Party Congress held in October 2017 and during the last session of the NPC, General Secretary and President Xi Jinping strengthened his position of power within the party, paving the way for the unlimited extension of his mandate, and increased the control of the party organs over the state apparatus and the economy, including the setting up of party cells in foreign enterprises; notes that the corresponding overhaul of the political system of the PRC is accompanied by a further shift in political focus towards a policy based on close surveillance in all areas; 52. Stresses that the creation of the National Supervisory Commission, whose legal status is equal to that of the courts and the public prosecutor, is a drastic step towards merging party and state functions, as it establishes a State supervisory body that takes its orders from and shares offices and staff with the Party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI); is concerned about the far-ranging personal consequences of this extension of the party supervision to a large number of people, as it means that the anticorruption campaign can be expanded to prosecute not just party members but also civil servants, from managers of state-owned companies to university professors and directors of village schools; 53. Observes that while the Social Credit System is still under construction, blacklists of noncompliant individuals and legal entities, as well as ‘red lists’ for outstanding individuals and companies, form the core of the current stage of implementation, whereby the main focus is on punishing offenders on the blacklists and rewarding those on the red lists; notes that in early 2017 China's Supreme People's Court stated that more than six million Chinese nationals had been banned from flying as a result of social misdeeds; firmly rejects the public naming and shaming of blacklisted persons as an integral part of the Social Credit System; underlines the importance and necessity of a dialogue between the EU institutions and their Chinese counterparts on all serious societal consequences of the present central planning and local experiments with the Social Credit System; 54. Expresses concern at China’s massive cyberspace surveillance systems and calls for the adoption of a regulation on enforceable privacy rights; condemns the ongoing crackdown on internet freedom by the Chinese authorities, in particular the freedom to access foreign websites, and regrets the policy of self-censorship adopted by some Western companies operating in China; recalls that eight out of the world's 25 most popular websites are blocked in China, including websites from major IT firms;