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ZHOU NAN
(Pronounced Joe Nan)
Agency.
Director of the Hong Kong Branch of the New China News
1927
1951-56
1956-62
1962-67
1971
1971-80
1980-81
Born in Qufu, Shandong Province.
Third, later Second, Secretary in the Chinese Embassy in Pakistan.
Section Chief in the West Asian and North African Affairs Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Second, later First, Secretary in the Chinese Embassy in Tanzania.
Member of the Information Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
First Secretary, later Counsellor, at the Chinese Mission to the United Nations.
Deputy Permanent Representative (with the rank of Ambassador) at the Chinese Mission to the United Nations.
Assistant Minister of Foreign Affairs.
1982-84
1984-90
A Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs.
1985-90
1990-
A Member of the Committee for Drafting the Basic Law of Hong Kong.
Director of the New China News Agency Hong Kong.
Zhou is a career diplomat and is now China's senior representative in Hong Kong. As Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, he was responsible for Western Europe and Hong Kong. He has been involved in Hong Kong matters almost from the outset of the negotiations on the future of the territory. He deputised for Yao Guang, the first leader of the Chinese delegation in the negotiations, in the summer of 1983, and took over formally from him as the chief Chinese negotiator at the beginning of 1984. Since then he has been at the heart of the Foreign Ministry's team on Hong Kong. Zhou has taken a consistently a hard line on Hong Kong and has been noticeably tougher than his predecessor as Director of the New China News Agency, Xu Jiatun. He has a sharp intellect, but is self-centred and ambitious, and these traits perhaps dominate his character. He switches easily between being pleasant and hectoring as the occasion demands.
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