several reasons for this. But one very strong cement is that 93 per cent of the population are Han, and there is a strong ethnic cement and a very long tradition over 2,000 or 3,000 years of holding together in the considerably unity of China.
If I may also comment on your original question, economic reform and political reform? At my farewell dinner in Peking in April 1991, given by the Chinese Foreign Minister, I asked him point blank 'Have you any thoughts about political reform in China, or have you just put that on the back burner forever?', and this reply was quite clear. He said 'No. We expect there will be political reform in China but not yet. We have first of all to lay down the infrastructure and to get our economy right, and then would be the time to move further towards political reform.'
Mr Edward Rowlands: So you think that China will almost be the last great Communist state, that the Communist Party and its ritual will continue to run in the form it has done?
Sir Alan Donald: I do not entirely understand the question because there is a great deal of confusion about the word 'Communist'. There are various kinds of Communists and what I think you are seeing emerging in China at the present time is a sort of authoritarian capitalism with the Party directing it. But how far it is following the tents of Karl Marx and Lenin I am not sure.
Sir Richard Evans:
I think it will be the last big country it already is to profess attachment to Marxism, and more importantly Leninism, the political component of Marxism and Leninism. I do not know whether North Korea, for example, or Vietnam might be the last. They are more likely to be the last in the world than China.
Mr David Sumberg: I would like to put to Sir Alan, so that we can evaluate the advice that he gives to this Committee, a past incident in relation to the time when he was in Peking (as
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