Xi Pens Article for Greek Newspaper Kathimerini

On November 10, 2019, ahead of his state visit to Greece, Chinese President Xi Jinping published a signed article in the Athens-based daily Kathimerini titled “Let Wisdom of Ancient Civilizations Shine Through the Future” (讓古老文明的智慧照鑒未來). The article described China and Greece as peer “great ancient civilizations” (偉大的古老文明), citing a claim by Greek novelist Nikos Kazantzakis that “Confucius and Socrates were two masks that covered the same face of human logic” — in this way using a Greek voice to lend credibility to his claims of deep culture affinity. Xi also urged both countries to cooperate more on the Belt and Road Initiative (一带一路), China’s massive global infrastructure program, which Greece formally joined in 2018. The article closed with a mention of a push for both countries toward “a community with a shared future for mankind” (人類命運共同體), one of the Chinese Communist Party’s key slogans for foreign policy, which frames China as the architect of an alternative global order to replace the Western-led one.