Cooperation in public diplomacy needed

Addressing a meeting of Asian and African countries' leaders in April, President Xi Jinping devised a new pattern for international relations based on cooperation and mutual benefits to make the world order fairer. This concept is a new contribution to international relations amid deepening multi-polarization and economic globalization, and at a time when mutual links, interdependence and integration of countries' interests have reached new heights.

This "new pattern" in international relations is reflected in the way China handles its ties with the United States. At the invitation of US President Barack Obama, President Xi is due to pay a state visit to the US in September. The visit will be a significant occasion to promote this new pattern in bilateral relations, especially because it is expected to advance all-round and strategic exchanges and cooperation in public diplomacy in a variety of fields.

The arrival of a fleet of US commercial ships in China in 1784 started bilateral exchanges between the two sides. Since the founding of New China in 1949, two countries' leaders - from late Chairman Mao Zedong to incumbent President Xi Jinping on the Chinese side and from former president Harry Truman to current President Barack Obama on the US side - have gradually gained a better understanding of Sino-US relations, which have seen deeper cooperation, intensive competition and even conflicts.