Innovations help to brighten China's overseas image

China's rising technological innovations helped brighten its image overseas last year, according to a report released by Xinhua News Agency on Thursday.

Xinhua gathered 5.2 million overseas online articles and comments from media and social networking services that reflect foreigners' impressions of China.

Technology featured prominently. Of 365,000 items on China's high-speed rail network, the world's largest, nearly 200,000 were deemed positive and more than 111,000 neutral.