Dai Bingguo

Dai Bingguo (; born March 31, 1941) is a Chinese politician and professional diplomat. Starting in 2008, Dai emerged as one of the foremost and highest-ranking figures of Chinese foreign policy in the Hu Jintao administration.

A graduate of Sichuan University, majoring in Russian language, Dai was instrumental in the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and the Soviet Union. Between 1989 and 1991 Dai served as the Chinese ambassador to Hungary. He then served in a succession of roles in the Department of Foreign Affairs. He served as a State Councilor, director of the Office of the Central Foreign Affairs Leading Group of CCP Central Committee, an office that acts as the primary foreign affairs organ of the Chinese Communist Party, and director of the general office of the National Security Leadership Group of the CCP Central Committee, in which he serves in the capacity as a national security advisor to the CCP General Secretary.

Early life Dai Bingguo was born on 31 March 1941 into a Tujia family in a remote village in Yinjiang County, Guizhou. His family descended from ancestors who had migrated from Ji'an, Jiangxi during the late Ming dynasty and integrated with the local population in Guizhou. Raised in a traditional four-generation rural household living under impoverished circumstances, Dai began working in the fields at age five. His childhood was marked by severe hardship and personal loss; three of his six siblings died young from disease, overwork and extreme poverty. His early education included studying classical Confucian texts in a local private school, a foundation preserved by his father during political turmoil. Because his home county lacked a high school at the time, Dai had to walk barefoot for three days across more than 150 km of mountainous terrain to reach the school, a journey he repeated twice a year over three years.

In 1959, Dai became the only student from his middle school to be admitted to an out-of-province key university, entering the Department of Foreign Languages at Sichuan University to major in Russian. Lacking financial resources, he gathered travel funds from local authorities, family members and high school teachers, arriving in Chengdu nine days after the term began. Following graduation, he studied at the China Foreign Affairs University (CFAU) from 1964 to 1965. Shortly after, he spent a year in Liuyang, Hunan, taking part in the Socialist Education Movement. In May 2003, Dai returned to the Foreign Ministry and served as Vice Minister until April 2008, being responsible for handling the North Korean nuclear crisis.

Foreign affairs leader Wang Qishan and former State Councilor Dai Bingguo holding a basketball in the Oval Office with U.S. President Barack Obama (2009) In March 2008, he was appointed State Councillor and Party group member on the State Council.

Dai Bingguo (right) and J.N. Dixit in 2004, 3rd round of talks of the Special Representative mechanism on the India-China boundary question Dai was appointed by Hu as his special representative to chair the Strategic Track of the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue for the Chinese side in 2009. From 2003 to 2013, he served as China's Special Representative for the India–China boundary question. After leaving office, he argued in 2017 that the border dispute could be resolved through Indian concessions on Tawang, a suggestion dismissed by Indian officials as impractical and impossible as Tawang is considered an integral part of the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh.

During Hu Jintao's administration, Dai developed the concept of China's "core interests" to define the primary goals that determine the country's foreign policy choices. The core interests are: maintaining the power of the Communist Party, continuing China's social and economic growth, and preservation of China's sovereignty and territorial integrity.

In March 2013, Dai Bingguo retired as a State Councillor at the end of his term and retired from politics in China.

Post-retirement In 2016, prior to the South China Sea Arbitration ruling, Dai stated that the ruling of the arbitration "amounts to nothing more than a piece of paper." Dai became chairman of Jinan University in November 2013, and he stepped down as chairman in November 2019.

In September 2019, Dai Bingguo represented Chinese President Xi Jinping to attend memorial ceremonies held by the French government in Paris for late President Jacques Chirac.

Personal Dai is married to Huang Hao, the daughter of former Culture Minister Huang Zhen. The couple have a son.

Awards and honors