Planning vital to diplomacy

Chinese President Xi Jinping has emphasized the importance of planning in tackling situations both at home and abroad, and to lay a solid foundation for the country's peaceful development. This, he said, should be the guiding principle for China's diplomacy.

The complicated domestic and foreign situations have created new challenges for China. The country has become the world's second largest economy, but it faces a harsher international environment today because some people are questioning its peaceful development path, sensationalizing the "China threat" theory and forcing it to shoulder more responsibilities than it can.

The "pivot-to-Asia" strategy of the United States is squeezing China's space by prompting some of its neighbors to align with Washington on the pretext of security concerns.