Between 25 January and 6 February 2010, Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi attended a regional summit on Afghanistan in Istanbul, the London Conference on Afghanistan, and the Munich Security Conference, and paid an official visit to Turkey, Cyprus and France. Upon conclusion of the visit, Foreign Minister Yang gave an interview to the Xinhua News Agency and China Central Television and shared with them his impression of the trip. Following is a transcript of the interview.

I. Minister Yang, at the beginning of the new year, you attended in quick succession three international conferences, two on Afghanistan and one on global security. You also paid an official visit to three countries, namely Turkey, Cyprus and France. We know that you met eight presidents, prime ministers and parliament speakers, and had talks with your counterparts from over 20 countries as well as the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Catherine Ashton and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. You also met the press and gave speeches on more than 10 occasions. What is your impression of these intensive diplomatic activities?

Yang: The world is undergoing profound and complex changes. Climate change and other global issues have become more acute and regional hotspot issues such as Afghanistan have attracted increasing attention. There are both fresh opportunities and new challenges for China’s relations with major countries. To improve and promote relations with major countries, enhance cooperation with all parties and properly handle major regional and international issues are all high on China’s diplomatic agenda this year.

At the beginning of the new year, I attended meetings on multilateral occasions and made bilateral visits. It provides an opportunity for extensive exchanges with various parties on the work of the whole year, so that we can work together to draft a “roadmap” for the advancement of our relations. It kicks off a good start for this year’s work. It also helps us to better implement the important agreement reached between leaders of China and other countries on promoting bilateral relations and strengthening cooperation on international and regional issues. This combination of multilateral and bilateral diplomatic activities also helps to broaden areas of exchanges and make our work more effective. My visit to Turkey, Cyprus and France not only helped to enhance friendly relations and cooperation with these three countries. They also contributed to the growth of China-EU relations and China’s relations with Islamic countries.

To conduct public diplomacy is also an important part of my visit. With increasing international influence and room for activities, China is attracting more attention from the international community. It has therefore become all the more important to strengthen public diplomacy. Meetings with the press and public speeches serve to encourage people from various social sectors of different countries to see China and its development in a right perspective and better appreciate China’s foreign policy and diplomatic work. This enhances mutual trust, reduces misgivings and expands common ground.

During the visit, I attended the Istanbul Summit on Friendship and Cooperation in the Heart of Asia as special representative of President Hu Jintao, and attended the London Conference on Afghanistan. This showed China’s support to the government and people of Afghanistan and its active posture on facilitating the settlement of the Afghan issue. China’s efforts were recognized and welcomed by the Afghan side and the international community. I had extensive exchanges of views with relevant parties during these two meetings, which contributed to the outcome of these meetings. The Istanbul Statement and the Conference Communiqué, adopted respectively by the two meetings, were of positive significance as they sent a signal of the international community standing side by side with the Afghan people. I also attended and addressed the Munich Security Conference, with a view to making China’s foreign policy better known and strengthening China’s dialogue and exchanges with various sectors of European countries.

II. China-EU relations have maintained the momentum of continued improvement and growth. There are both new opportunities and challenges ahead. Minister Yang, could you please share with us your assessment of the prospects of relations between China and the EU?

Yang: China and the EU are both important forces in an increasingly multi-polar world. Both are at critical stages of development. We are each other’s important trading partners and enjoy all-dimensional, wide-ranging and multi-tiered cooperation. We have established a comprehensive strategic partnership. The all-round development of China-EU relations has fully proved that the two sides share broad common interests. The two sides are linked by historical, practical and strategic bonds, and on the whole there are more opportunities than challenges in China-EU relations. China will work with the EU to maintain steady and sound development of our relations and further enrich the strategic dimension of our relationship. We will enhance political mutual trust, treat each other as equals, and respect and accommodate each other’s core concerns. We will expand mutually beneficial cooperation, create new highlights of cooperation in areas such as sustainable development, jointly oppose trade protectionism and promote recovery of the world economy. We will strengthen cultural and people-to-people exchanges to increase popular support for our relations. We will deepen communication and coordination and work together to meet global challenges, promote greater progress in China-EU comprehensive strategic partnership and contribute to world peace, stability and prosperity.

III. During your attendance at these international conferences and bilateral visits, you expounded on many occasions China’s stern position on US arms sales to Taiwan and Dalai’s visit to the United States. Would you please say a few words about that?

Yang: Since recently, the Chinese side has made several rounds of representations with the US side concerning US arms sales to Taiwan. We stressed that the Taiwan issue is the most sensitive issue at the core of China-US relations and urged the US side to strictly abide by the three China-US Joint Communiqués, the August 17 Communiqué in particular. We urged the US side to fully recognize the grave danger of arms sales to Taiwan and stop weapons sales to Taiwan, so as to prevent damage to the overall China-US relations and China-US cooperation in important areas. The Chinese side has made repeated serious representations with the US side regarding another attempt by Dalai to visit the United States and meet President Obama. We strongly urged the US side to fully recognize that Dalai is not merely a religious figure, but a political exile long engaged in separatist activities against his motherland under the cloak of religion. We strongly urged the US side to fully appreciate the high sensitivity of Tibet-related issues, take China’s position and concern seriously, and immediately correct its wrong decision. The US side should not allow Dalai to visit the United States and there should not be any contact between the US leadership and Dalai. This will help to avoid further damage to China-US relations.