COURTESY TRANSLATION
"Dear Friend and Colleague,
I
During my visit to China, from the 19th to the 22nd May, met the Secretary-General of the Party, Jiang Zemin, Prime Minister Li Peng and Foreign Minister Qian Qichen. All three showed great interest in resuming and strengthening the dialogue with the West. To
that China could contribute to the
War.
convinced
me they seemed
setting-up of a new international order following the end of the Cold This feeling was confirmed subsequently when the government of Peking backed the American initiative to start talks, amongst the permanent members of the Security Council, on the control of arms
sales in the wake of the Gulf war.
As for the respect of human rights, I have noticed a positive evolution and more willingness to discuss the problem. The Chinese are, for instance, prepared to welcome an Italian
parliamentary delegation that will be able to visit
August. They have not avoided discussing the
discussing the subject which was previously considered an unbearable interference.
Tibet next
Dialogue and cooperation with the West are after all the path to follow in order to encourage China to continue with its
reforms policy and to pursue a stance closer to ours as far as the
observance of some fundamental liberties is concerned.
I think, therefore,
that the moment has come for us to
start thinking about the need to improve our relations with China, which represents a necessary
reference point for the European Community's action, not only in Asia. Especially since the Community has reassessed, or is in the process of doing so, its instruments of dialogue and cooperation with some of its major interlocutors, from the United States to Japan, in parallel with the deepening of its integration process.
./.