China signed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in 1998 and has been actively studying the issue of its ratification and implementation. In the studies，it should be noted that with respect to its relations with domestic legal systems，the Covenant is of authoritative，independent，minimum，limited，supplementary and supervisory nature. Those natures should be the most important elements to take into account when China ratifies and implements the Covenant，and the primary issues for Chinese scholars to study the Covenant.