The year 2011 marks the 90th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China. Few political parties in the world have 90 years of history, and it is even rarer for a 90-year-old political party to maintain such vitality. One of the important reasons why the Party has maintained such vitality after 90 years of stupendous changes is that the Party always maintains pace with the times.
Pierre Cardin launched a modern art exhibition in Paris at the beginning of 2003, and many Chinese artists participated in the exhibition. As Pierre Cardin is an old friend of mine, he invited me to attend the opening ceremony to deliver a speech.
When I arrived at the exhibition, I saw many works of art displayed inside and outside the exhibition hall. The most attractive work outside the exhibition hall was a dozen or so red dinosaurs. The intentions of the artists who created these dinosaurs were self-evident.
I pointed out during the speech that dinosaurs were the dominant species in the terrestrial ecosystem on the planet for more than 160 million years. Today, dinosaurs have completely disappeared, and people can only see their fossils. Why did dinosaurs become extinct? Scientists have different opinions and different theories. However, I think there is one point about which everyone will agree, which is that dinosaurs failed to adapt to the new environment when the Earth was experiencing important changes. As a result, they became extinct.
The history of their extinction tells us a truth that adapting to changes in the world is necessary. Why can China achieve such great progress? If you visit China and communicate with people from all walks of life in China, you will find that the people's favorite phrase is "advancing with the times." As the world is changing, the Chinese people do not stay in the past. They advance with the times. Therefore, China can continue to make progress.
My address won warm applause and praise from many French people because they thought what I said just made sense.
"Vhina has friends all over the world" were the words of former Chinese President Mao Zedong. Why does China have friends everywhere? The reason is that a very long period of the 20th century was characterized by wars and revolutions, during which, imperialism and colonialism were oppressing the whole world, and the people around the world surely rose up to fight. The Chinese revolution was part of the great resistance wave. China supported revolutions in other countries, and other countries in turn supported China's revolution. Since the oppressed nations and people accounted for a majority of the world population, China surely has friends all over the world.
Pursuing national independence and liberation was a righteous cause. In addition to the oppressed nations' whole-hearted commitment to the cause, many people around the world who embraced peace and justice also offered sympathy and support to the cause. Edgar Snow, author of the book "Red Star over China," is a good example.
However, things changed over time. The world has transitioned from times of war and revolution to times of peace and development, which is the greatest change in international relations. Given the changes in the situation at home and abroad, the Party resolutely initiated a strategic transformation in 1978 to shift the focus of its work to economic construction and made major adjustments to China's diplomatic polices.
China has made unprecedented progress in economic cooperation with other countries by sticking to the path of peaceful development and the win-win strategy of opening-up. From 1978 to 2010, China’s foreign trade volume increased from 20.6 billion U.S. dollars to 2.8 trillion U.S. dollars, with foreign direct investments in the country increasing from zero to more than 1 trillion U.S. dollars. China has made rapid and considerable progress in its relations with developed countries as well as the developing countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America on the basis of equality and mutual benefit.
Given that an important feature of China's rise is that it benefits both China and the rest of the world, it is no wonder that China has friends all over the world.
By Wu Jianming, a member of the European Academy of Sciences and the International Eurasian Academy of Sciences, translated by People's Daily Online
