Speaking to the world

Fu's new book elaborates upon her responses to hot-button issues, including Sino-US relations, situations concerning the South China Sea and China's preference for an international-rather than a world-order. But Fu confesses some of the viewpoints have changed over time.

Wang Jisi, director of Peking University's Institute of International and Strategic Studies, says it's important that China sticks to its general diplomatic principles and sustains its diplomatic resolve-and this outlook is apparent in Fu's anthology.

Fu has an educational background in English and international relations. The 65-year-old served as the Chinese ambassador to the Philippines, Australia and the United Kingdom from 1998 to 2009.

She became China's vice-foreign minister in 2009. And she served as spokeswoman of the National People's Congress from 2013 to 2017.

Fu says the questions she has been frequently asked during her four-decade diplomatic career include: What kind of country does China want to be? What does China want from the world? What does China bring to the world?

Encountering these questions made Fu realize the world wants to know more about China's economic growth and political system, and what its people think.

"China is bringing changes to the world through making changes in China. We need to better interpret ourselves so as to convince the world," Fu writes in her book's preface.

That China's development is reshaping the world calls for the cultivation of a more sensitive perception of changes outside the country, she says.

Fu is astute at revealing that deeper truths lie beyond what looks simple on the surface, according to Tsinghua University's vice-president Yang Bin.

In the article, Fu clarifies how China has mediated between the US and the DPRK.