Diplomatic Pouch | Mike Peters

EU Ambassador Markus Ederer hosted a cocktail reception last week to kick off the delegation's 2013 Tour of China. The tour is designed to showcase Europe's wide array of research and innovation opportunities in nine major Chinese cities expecting to reach an audience of more than 2,500 Chinese researchers, scientists and innovation stakeholders.

The tour opened in Northeast China at the Harbin Institute of Technology. Over its two-month duration, participants will visit China's most prolific universities in the fields of research and innovation, stopping in Shenyang, Xi'an, Wuhan, Chongqing, Tianjin, Nanjing and Shanghai, and concluding in Beijing. The closing event will be held in tandem with this November's EU-China Summit, Ederer says.

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Chinese President Xi Jinping received the credentials of 15 new ambassadors to China earlier this month, the Xinhua News Agency reports. The ambassadors are Michael Kinyanjui from Kenya, Mohammad Kabir Farahi from Afghanistan, Stefan Skjaldarson from Iceland, Ralph Thomas from Jamaica, Clifford Borg Marks from Malta, Karl Hood from Grenada, Michael Christian Max Clauss from Germany, Dyomin Oleg from the Ukraine, Paul Kavanagh from Ireland, Ringo Abed from Namibia, Magdy Mahmoud Helmy Amer from Egypt, Chynar Rustemova from Turkmenistan, Michel Malherbe from Belgium, Paul Steinmetz from Luxembourg, and Jari Gustafsson from Finland.

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China's Vice-Foreign Minister Liu Zhenmin was the special guest of the Republic of Korea's ambassador Kwon Young-se at the country's National Day reception last week.

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Lithuanian Ambassador Lina Antanaviciene (pictured) hosted a cocktail reception last weekend to open a photography exhibition by Marius Jovaisa. One of several events marking her country's current role in the EU's revolving presidency, Unseen Lithuania, includes images of Old Town in the capital, Vilius; pure Lithuanian lakes and serene green valleys, as well as the "romantic perfection of the sunrise". The exhibition of 250 large photographs is traveling around the world. It will remain on display at the China Millennium Monument Museum of Digital Arts through Nov 3.

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Italian Language Week, organized by the Swiss embassy in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Institute of Beijing, will wrap up with a literary conference with Swiss-Italian author Fabio Pusterla (in Italian and Chinese) at three venues: the Communication University of China (3 pm on Oct 28), Beijing Foreign Language University (8:45 am on Oct 29) and the Italian Cultural Institute (7 pm on Oct 29).

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Major figures in politics and business urged the United States and China to forge closer ties for the benefit of world interests recently at the annual gala of the National Committee on US-China Relations. The gala is the major fundraiser for the nonprofit group, which encourages productive Sino-US relations.

Committee President Stephen Orlins told guests at the Plaza Hotel: "I dream of American children studying Chinese in their schools as regularly as Spanish" not only to understand the language but also to appreciate Chinese culture and history.

Other speakers included Tang Jiaxuan, former state councilor of China and former minister of foreign affairs; Cui Tiankai, China's ambassador to the US; Sun Guoxiang, consul-general of China in New York; and Liu Jieyi, China's permanent representative to the United Nations.

The evening also included a salute to the Philadelphia Orchestra, which visited China 40 years ago - a year after then US president Richard Nixon's visit to Beijing. For the gala, some of the orchestra's current members played two pieces from the 1973 orchestra's program.

Send embassy news to michaelpeters@chinadaily.com.cn.

(China Daily 10/27/2013 page5)