2003 in China

Incumbents

• Party General Secretary - Hu Jintao
• President – Jiang Zemin to March 15, Hu Jintao
• Premier – Zhu Rongji to March 16, Wen Jiabao
• Vice President – Hu Jintao to March 15, Zeng Qinghong
• Vice Premier – Li Lanqing to March 6, Huang Ju
• Congress Chairman - Li Peng to March 15, Wu Bangguo
• Conference Chairman - Li Ruihuan to March 14, Jia Qinglin

  Events

January

• January 7 to January 8 – Hefei student protests occur, marking the largest student protests since the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989.

  February

• February 24 – 2003 Bachu earthquake: An earthquake measuring 6.3 in magnitude occurred in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region in northwest China, killing 191 people and 291 hospitalised. Almost 10,000 homes were leveled by the earthquake.

  March

• March 15 – Hu Jintao becomes President of the People's Republic of China, replacing Jiang Zemin.

  June

• June 1 – The People's Republic of China begins filling the lake behind the massive Three Gorges Dam, raising the water level near the dam over 100 meters.

  October

• October 15 – China successfully launches Shenzhou 5, their first manned space mission, becoming the third country in the world to have independent human spaceflight capability after the Soviet Union and the United States.

  December

• December 23 - A PetroChina Chuandongbei natural gas field explosion in Chongqing, 234 people lives.

  Deaths

• February 11 – Ma Sanli, Chinese comedian
• March 17 – Su Buqing, Chinese mathematician and educator
• April 1 – Zhang Guorong, Cantonese singer and actor
• June 17 – Zheng Wenguang, science fiction author
• July 5 – Zhang Aiping, Chinese communist military leader
• October 25 – Yao Guang, diplomat, foreign ambassador
• November 15 – T. Y. Lin, Chinese-born civil engineer
• November 19 – Shi Zhecun, Chinese author
• December 27 – Ying Ruocheng, Chinese actor, director, playwright and Vice Minister of Culture from 1986 to 1990