By Ibrahim Nafie When we arrived in Beijing, Bill Clinton's recent visit to the Chinese capital was still the topic of the day. Clinton's nine-day tour was the longest undertaken by the American president to any country, and the first visit of a US president to China in nine years. When making plans for our Asian tour we intentionally made China our last stop, planning our arrival to come in the wake of Bill Clinton's visit. Our intention in doing this was two-fold. Firstly, we wanted our dialogue with Chinese officials to be as comprehensive as possible, covering the most pressing Asian issues, including the crisis resulting from Indian and Pakistani nuclear explosions and the unravelling Asian economic melt-down. Secondly, we would be afforded with an opportunity to assess the results of the US president's visit to China at both the regional and international level. During an exhaustive schedule of meetings the delegation of Al-Ahram journalists held talks with a great many senior officials, meetings crowned by an interesting dialogue with the Chinese Prime Minister Zhu Rong Ji. Our meetings covered a number of issues, from development in China to the strategic cooperation announced during Clinton's visit. We covered the problems and obstacles faced by the Chinese during their period of economic reform, ways of improving the standards of living of the Chinese people and other major topics of regional and international concern. In all of these dialogues, Chinese officials took care to express their ideas clearly and without ambiguity, something that characterised the replies we received from all officials, as well as from scholars and the experts working in the Chinese Institute for Contemporary International Affairs and the Chinese Institute for International Studies. This straight-forwardness was most helpful in enabling us to gain a clear understanding of Chinese attitudes and positions. Our meeting with the prime minister was particularly informative. He explained China's point of view on a number of international and domestic issues and problems. The meeting was originally to last for half an hour. However, thanks to the prime minister's expansiveness, as well as the many topics we had to discuss, the meeting lasted a full hour, in spite of the prime minister's many responsibilities. Our dialogues with Chinese officials brought into focus China's experience of economic reform, its conduct of foreign relations and its strategies for containing the financial crisis that has rocked the countries of south east Asia. Our stay in Beijing lasted a full week, during which we observed a shift in Chinese officials' assessment of the results of Clinton's visit. During the first two days of our stay -- Clinton's tour had ended the day before we arrived -- we found the media proclaiming the declaration of the strategic partnership between China and the US. By the end of our visit, however, a more sober assessment of the visit had emerged. Three successive joint statements: one announcing the protocol agreement on biological weapons; the second a joint communiqué on anti-personnel land mines and the third a joint statement on events in South Asia, marked the high point of the American tour, focusing on areas of mutual cooperation between China and the US. Towards the end of our stay, however, assessments of Clinton's visit had turned to points of difference, including Taiwan, Chinese membership of the World Trade Organisation, and human rights. One of the most important conclusions we drew from our talks with officials in Beijing was that China is a responsible country, willing to shoulder its international and regional obligations. It has no intention of attacking, threatening to attack or intimidating any other country. It was our impression that this was the message China wished to convey to its neighbours, particularly to India, which had justified its nuclear tests partly on the grounds of the potential threat represented by China. Some neighbouring countries had expressed their anxiety over the declaration of the strategic partnership between China and the US, as well as over China's potential for economic growth. Deputy Foreign Minister Ji Pei Ding was keen to emphasise that a commitment to regional stability was a fundamental principle of China's foreign policy, which is grounded on principles of peaceful coexistence. Such principles underlay China's willingness to help its neighbours during the economic crisis. China has offered a total of $4 billion in financial aid to the worst stricken as opposed to the US's $1 billion. The volume of aid from Japan is hardly worth mentioning -- indeed Japan acted quickly to capitalise on the crisis by devaluing its currency in order to boost exports and offset its losses. The Japanese attitude was sharply criticised by Chinese officials and was the subject of a lengthy explication by the prime minister. China refused to devalue its own currency, a move that, in the opinion of Chinese leaders, would only have worsened the Asian crisis even though the Chinese economy itself might have stood to gain. It is apparent to the visitor to Beijing and other major Chinese cities that the behaviour of ordinary people, in dress and in lifestyle, is virtually identical to that in Western cities, long steeped in the capitalist tradition. Yet the Chinese Communist Party continues to make its presence felt in public life, and remains strongly centralist. However fast economic reforms progress what is certain, according to the State Department's director of information, is that China will resist wholesale privatisation. What China seeks to do, he said, is to improve the performance of the public and collective sectors by freeing them of unnecessary bureaucracy. The Chinese believe, then, that in their reforms they are advancing socialism, not importing a capitalist system. Finally, we also sensed in China a great admiration for Egypt and for the role of President Hosni Mubarak in promoting peace in the Middle East. The Chinese prime minister also expressed respect for Dr Kamal El-Ganzouri, whom he has invited to Beijing to continuediscussions on economic cooperation between Egypt and China. We were also heartened by the manner in which our delegation was received, and the respect the newspaper commands in media, political and intellectual circles. In all our meeting we found it difficult to find words to convey our gratitude for the warmth which we met in China. If such mutual feelings are indicative of anything it is that Egypt and China have in common a legacy of civilisation. They have made great contributions to the history of mankind, a legacy on which they are both constantly building.
