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The outgoing year of 2006 has witnessed more dynamic developments in
party politics and more interactions among political parties across
the world. Seizing opportunities and forging ahead with an
enterprising spirit, the Communist Party of China has scored
gratifying progress in the field of its external relations. Just as
the old year was approaching the end, Xinhua correspondent had an
interview with Minister Wang Jiarui of the International Department
of the CPC Central Committee on this topic.
Q: Could you first of all give a brief account on the CPC's foreign
affairs work in the past year?
A: 2006 has been another fruitful year for our party in terms of its
external relations. In the light of the requirements of the central
leadership and to the general situation at home and abroad, the
CPC's work on the international front has been carried out in a
down-to-earth and innovative manner and has consequently rendered
new contributions to the all-round advancement of the CPC's
party-building programme, to the better employment of the country's
diplomatic resources, to the promotion of the idea of building a
harmonious world, and to the publicity of China's opening-up
strategy of sticking to the road of peaceful development and seeking
reciprocal and all-win cooperation with others. At the same time,
our work has taken more diversified forms and displayed its unique
strength.
Q: Could you talk more specifically about the Party's international
activities and how they have served the overall foreign strategy of
the country?
A: First of all, the Party's international exchanges have been dedicated
to the enhancement and development of state-to-state relations. Just
thumb open this year's chronicle of inter-party exchanges, you would
find that reelected General Secretary Nong Duc Manh of the
Vietnamese Communist Party and newly elected General Secretary of
the Lao People's Revolutionary Party and state President Choummaly Sayasone both visited China at the invitation of the CPC shortly
after their respective party congresses. And less than six months
later, General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee and Chinese
President Hu Jintao paid a state visit to the two countries
respectively. Such frequent meetings between top party leaders have
forcefully elevated the level of China-Vietnam and China-Laos good-neighbourly
relations and friendly cooperation. China and Vietnam have also
established a high profile cross-department steering committee for
bilateral cooperation.
In the past year, major parties, both ruling and non-ruling, from
Germany, Britain, Australia, New Zealand, India, South Korea, Japan,
as well as from other countries in Latin America, Africa, West Asia
and Eastern Europe have sent their delegations to China. Meanwhile,
the CPC also sent out delegations to Italy, Austria, Mexico, Peru,
Columbia and many other countries. With a view to normalizing state
relations, the CPC has continued this year to develop contacts with
political parties in countries with no diplomatic relationship with
China. These exchanges have not only helped consolidate and enhance
state relations, but also promoted the basic common understanding of
the one China principle in the international community.
Secondly, the Party's international exchanges have played an active and
supporting role in the major diplomatic moves of the nation. For
example, the visits of the leading Indian political parties and
their think-tanks at the CPC's invitation have enriched the
"China-India Friendship Year". Also, as part of the efforts to
retrieve China-Japan relations from deteriorating, we timely
strengthened exchanges with the ruling coalition of Japan through
the platform of the ˇ°China-Japan Exchange Mechanism of Ruling
Partiesˇ± while continuing contacts with other parties in Japan.
Shortly after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's visit to China, I traveled
to Japan as head of the CPC delegation to attend the second session
of the ˇ°China-Japan Exchange Mechanism of Ruling Partiesˇ±. The
inter-party discussions enabled the two sides to better understand
each other's positions and broaden consensus. On the occasions of
the Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, the
summit meeting commemorating the 5th anniversary of the Shanghai
Cooperation Organization and the Commemorative Summit marking the
15th anniversary of China-ASEAN dialogue relations, corresponding
measures were taken on the party level to step up contacts and
exchanges with parties from relevant countries. More importantly,
the visits paid by members of the Standing Committee of the
Political Bureau to related regions, namely Wu Guanzheng's visit to
Africa and Li Changchun's tour of Central Asia and Europe, as well
as Polit-Bureau members Liu Yunshan and and He Yong's trips to
Southeast Asia and India respectively, have directly added weight to
the above mentioned diplomatic endeavours.
Thirdly, the CPC's external relations have also provided facilitation to
the solution of international and regional hot-spot issues. One of
the conspicuous features of international developments this year was
the heating up of hot spots one after another and incessant regional
disturbances, towards which a greater role was expected from China.
Facing such new circumstances, and proceeding from the general
interest of China's overall foreign strategy, the CPC took the
initiative to play its part and intensified inter-party exchanges in
these hot-spot regions. We hosted DPRK leader Kim Jong Il in his
unofficial visit to China at the beginning of the year, and invited
major political parties from Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Iraq and
Iran to visit China. In the year, the CPC sent out two delegations
to the Middle East, headed by Comrades Wang Lequan and Liu Qi
respectively. It proved that the CPC can play a favourable role in
the settlement of hot spot issues by speaking to different forces
and offering its good offices in candid dialogues with parties
concerned.
Q: How did the CPC's relations with foreign parties promote the general
domestic development?
A: First, we stressed a lot on sharing experience of state governing with
other parties. For Example, building a new countryside has been one
of the main topics in our discussions with African and Latin
American parties, whereas our dialogues with European partners also
involves subjects like how to secure social harmony, etc. Second, we
tried to boost trade and economic cooperation along with
party-to-party exchanges. When Comrade Zhang Dejiang headed a party
delegation on a visit abroad earlier this year, he was again
accompanied by a business entourage, which signed some USD 4 billion
contracts during the trip, yielding more fruitful results in the
effort to promote political relations and economic links at the same
time. Meanwhile, the visits to China paid by senior officials from
Finland, Belgium, Malta and Senegal as guests of the CPC in their
dual capacities as both party and government leaders provided great
impetus to the mutually-beneficial cooperation between China and
these countries in areas of trade, developmental aid,
infrastructures and energy resources. Third, we have also tried to
provide services through our work to provinces and municipalities as
well as other departments of the CPC Central Committee.
Q: What did your department do in the past year in serving the CPC's
party-building efforts?
A: This year, focusing on the Party's new theoretical propositions of
putting people first, upholding the scientific outlook on
development, building a socialist harmonious society, building a new
socialist countryside, building an innovation-driven nation and
establishing a socialist view of honour and disgrace, we in the
International Department, favoured by our unique ties with various
kinds of political parties in different countries, and based on our
long-term studies on party politics and trends of thought, have
carried out quite a deal of research work through setting up
thematic research groups, dispatching study teams abroad and
organizing international seminars, with an attempt to pool wisdom of
other parties and draw on their experience that may be of reference
to the building of our own Party. Over the year, we have managed to
accomplish nearly a hundred reports on a series of important
subjects including practices of foreign ruling parties in securing
social harmony; theories and practices in social development of
other countries, relations between reform and the strength of
governing parties and rural development experience in other
countries, etc.
Q: The Central Foreign Affairs Work Conference set forth new requirements
to foster an objective and friendly climate of public opinions. What
role can party diplomacy play in this regard?
A: In inter-party exchanges, the people we deal with are mainly political
leaders who have significant influence in the domestic and foreign
policies of their countries. This year, we received more than 200
party delegations in China, and the CPC sent out some one hundred
groups to different parts of the world. Through these exchanges of
visit, we were able to meet several thousand political figures of
various countries. The purpose of our work mainly focuses on
in-depth discussions on issues and developments of common interest
in bilateral and multi-lateral relations. Apart from expatiating on
China's foreign policies and the achievements in our national
development when meeting other parties, we also try to talk more
about China's political system, our party establishment and the
CPC's efforts to develop itself, so that our partners may have a
better understanding of our country and our Party.
All the above shows that party diplomacy serves as an important tool for
the building of China's soft power and that the Party's foreign
affairs workers constitute a vital contingent in the field of
external publicity.
Q: You have repeatedly mentioned the need to exploit advantages. Could
you please elaborate a bit on the most outstanding advantage of
party-to-party exchanges?
A: The most outstanding advantage in the CPC's exchanges with foreign
partners lies in its people-oriented style of work. As the saying
goes, ˇ°Between heaven and earth, man comes first.ˇ± With the on-going
trends towards multipolarity and economic globalization, political
parties across the world are rising and falling in more frequent
turns, and domestic affairs of a country are increasingly interlaced
with international relations. As a matter of fact, politicians are
always the key players in the ups and downs of party politics.
Having relations in one form or another with over 400 parties in
some 160 countries in the world, every year the CPC, through
inter-party exchanges, contacts with more than a thousand senior
politicians as we try keenly to make as many friends as possible and
to forge close ties with them. Among the people we meet are leaders
of both ruling and non-ruling parties, both incumbent heavyweight
officials and promising young people who are about to take leading
positions. We have friends in countries both with and without
diplomatic ties with China. Given the fact that in many countries,
political parties take office in turns, maintaining a solid
friendship with these people is of great significance to ensuring
friendly relations with various countries.
Q: Lastly, what's your plan for the new year?
A: 2007 will be a year for us to further implement the spirits of the
16th CPC Congress and the plenums of the Central Committee, as well
as the spirit of the central foreign affairs work conference.
Moreover, the year 2007 will also see the holding of the 17th
National Congress of the CPC. In this connection, the Party's work
on external relations will continue to be guided by Deng Xiaoping
Theory and the important thought of ˇ°Three Representsˇ±. We will
exercise our duties in line with the scientific thinking on
development, and make more effective publicity of our developmental
achievements scored on all fronts since the last Congress of the
Party. Having our eye on the up-coming CPC Congress, we will try to
find out more regularities implied in the Party's work of foreign
exchanges, draw out our strong points and make fresh contribution to
the strengthening of our Party, to the all-round implementation of
China's foreign strategies, to the building of a harmonious world
and to the implementation of the decisions made at the central
foreign affairs work conference.
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