With the ‘excellent’ relationship between Paris and Beijing, the head of French diplomacy, Alain Juppe, was greeted in Beijing today by Foreign Minister, Mr. Yang Jiechi.

“I’ve always felt like a friend of China’s. I’ve always tried to promote that the French-Chinese relationship and now they have an excellent relationship”, said Mr. Juppe.

“I’ve made many trips to China during these past twenty years and I can see the extraordinary progress that the Chinese have achieved under the leadership of the Chinese authorities,” he added.

The French Ministry of Foreign Affairs are scheduled to meet on Tuesday with Chinese Premier, Wen Jiabao, and then dine with the most senior Chinese Foreign Politian and State Councilor, Dai Bingguo.

Zhuhai and Guangzhou

He visited Beijing Language and Culture University to further promote its ‘French Language Year’ theme in the morning and gave a speech and answered questions from students at Tsinghua University.

Tomorrow Alain Juppe will be visiting the major cities in the southern part of China, Zhuhai and Guangzhou. In Zhuhai, he will inaugurate the Sino-French Institute of Nuclear Engineering & Technology (IFCEN), which aims to train 100 to 150 Chinese in nuclear engineering via French academic standards and methods. 

Last Thursday, Mr. Juppe passed by Hong Kong and reassured Asian countries about the strength of the European Union’s economy.

Source: Le Figaro, September 13, 2011