Written by by Alyssa Chen at scmp.com
In a letter to a long-time American friend, Chinese president Xi Jinping praised the role of ordinary people in advancing US-China ties and pushed for more people-to-people exchanges between the two superpowers.
Xi
The message to Sarah Lande of Muscatine, Iowa – the small Midwestern city where Xi led a delegation nearly four decades ago – said China was ready to work with the US to push for the steady, sound and sustainable development of bilateral relations.
Xi said the achievements in China-US relations were primarily attributable to the collective efforts of the people of the two countries and expressed hopes that renewed exchanges could lead to mutual understanding and affection between people from both countries.
“China and the US are the world’s largest developing and developed countries, and the future and destiny of this planet demand China-US relations to be more stable and to be better,” Xi told Lande, who is widely recognised as a citizen diplomat who promotes people-to-people exchanges between Iowa and the globe.
Xi added that he welcomed students from Muscatine to participate in friendly exchanges.
The correspondence came nearly two months after Xi’s meeting with his US counterpart Joe Biden in San Francisco, which paved the way for improved ties after a year of worsening tensions.
During that trip to California, Xi unveiled a plan for 50,000 young Americans to visit China for study and other activities over the next five years in a bid to boost exchanges, which were paused for years during the Covid-19 pandemic.