Although President Xi Jinping’s state visit to Britain is supposed to herald the beginning of a golden era of partnership between China and the United Kingdom, the visit has already been marred in controversy with many questioning why the government is teaming up with a country with a history of human rights abuses.
Still, readers of today’s broadsheets could be forgiven for believing that we are already in the full grip of China-mania. Today’s Financial Times has six full-page adverts from Chinese companies welcoming the Chinese president.
Meanwhile, in both today’s Times and Telegraph there is a full-page advert — half written in Chinese — offering ‘a warm welcome to President Xi Jinping of China on his state visit to the United Kingdom’.
The advert in today’s Times
The advert is placed by the Chinese drink’s company Wuliangye in partnership with the UK’s Philharmonia orchestra. Pushing the partnership of the two countries, they say that ‘no distance can keep people with same goals and ideals apart’:
‘It’s an irresistible trend that we together create in a flourishing era. May the friendship between UK and China be everlasting.’
Strong stuff. So, is this a canny Chinese company trying to push the controversial visit to the British people for profitable gain? Well, it’s slightly more complicated than that, with the advert from the state-owned Chinese drinks company likely to make for pleasing reading for the British government who actually aided the original project.
Heralded as the ‘first ever-major partnership between a Chinese company and a UK arts organisation’, the deal was sealed at a Downing Street reception earlier this year. At the event, culture minister Ed Vaizey gushed about how the partnership ‘offers a model for future relationships with other partners in both countries’:
‘2015 marks the first UK-China Year of Cultural Exchange and cultural cooperation between the UK and China has never been stronger. It is inspiring to see this new and enlightened partnership between the Philharmonia Orchestra and Wuliangye, which not only offers so much to both organisations, but also offers a model for future relationships with other partners in both countries.’
Mr S suspects that ministers will be pleased to see their message put across with such prominence in today’s papers.
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