Speech by Foreign Minister Wang Yi at the Opening of the Symposium On International Developments and China's Diplomacy in 2016
3 December 2016
Distinguished experts,
Dear friends,
Dear friends,
Good morning!
Before we even notice it,
we are now approaching the end of 2016. I still remember that I said at
last year's symposium that 2016 would see accelerated adjustment and
transformation of the international architecture from a new starting
point. Looking back today, that assessment has been proven correct on
the whole, with some changes even more dramatic than expected. The world
economy remains sluggish. Brexit has caught everyone by surprise. The
Middle East is mired in aggravating tension. And there is growing
backlash against globalization. All these taken into account, I would
encapsulate the world situation in 2016 with two words, "volatility" and
"turbulence". We are seeing a more volatile and turbulent world, one
with greater uncertainty and instability that the international
community finds deeply unsettling. On the other hand, we must also
recognize that this is the unavoidable result of the realignment and
transformation of the international architecture. It brings about not
just new challenges, but also new opportunities. For countries around
the world, what matters most is how to seize the opportunities, overcome
challenges and make the international architecture more peaceful,
stable and equitable, and better serve development and prosperity of our
world.
For China's diplomacy,
2016 can be summed up as an important year in which China has blazed new
paths and made new progress. Facing the complex and fast-changing
international situation, under the strong leadership of the Party
Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping as its core and guided by the
foreign policy it sets out, we have forged ahead and overcome various
difficulties. We have secured a sound external environment conducive to
China's development amidst the grim world situation, and elevated
China's standing, influence, and institutional rights in the changing
international system. In 2016, China is more proactive, more
enterprising, more confident and more mature in the diplomatic arena. It
has made steady progress in developing a distinctive diplomatic
approach befitting China's role as a major country with a series of
important achievements that have made the Chinese people proud and also
won international admiration.
