LISBON (AFP) - China needs to improve civil liberties if it wants to maintain a high rate of economic growth, European Union Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson has said.

"I believe that if China wants to have sustainable economic growth it must take steps to increase the freedoms and the creativity of its people," he told daily business newspaper Diario Economico Monday.

The former British cabinet minister also called on China to do more to reduce barriers to the entry of overseas investors and exporters to its market.

"If Peking wants its partners to maintain their openness to China, it must adopt reciprocal measures," he said.

With a national economic output of 2.26 trillion US dollars (1.79 trillion euros), China's economy earlier this year became the world's fourth-largest economy, after that of the United States, Japan and Germany.

Earlier this month China's central bank estimated that the nation's economy should grow by 10.5 percent this year, after expanding 10.2 percent in 2005.

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