By Xinhua News

At the 2026 World Robot Conference, we saw China’s robotic hands in action, from welding cars on factory lines to sorting packages in warehouses, from making coffee to sensing a feather landing on a robotic palm. They’re not perfect yet. The real challenge ahead is making these systems reliable, flexible and useful beyond the lab or the show floor.

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Bathed in stage lights, dancers move gracefully before a cluster of cameras. On the other side of the lens, viewers respond in real time, with comments and emojis streaming up the screen, virtual gifts arriving, and thousands tuning in from homes across the country.

The performers belong to the Guangzhou Song and Dance Theatre in south China’s Guangdong Province. Known for productions inspired by traditions such as the lion dance, the troupe is among a growing number of arts groups turning to livestreaming and social media to connect with audiences beyond the theater.

For He Mu, a dancer with the troupe, the digital stage offers an entirely unexpected element.

After a serious knee injury forced her to bow out from the stage in 2025, He feared that the performing career she had spent more than two decades building might be put on hold. When the theater later launched a livestreaming program, however, she found her way back beneath the lights.

Accustomed to the distant gaze of theater audiences, He stepped into the livestream studio with little experience in front of cameras and almost no instinct for online interaction. She had prepared only a handful of Dunhuang-inspired dances.

The response took her by surprise. “Viewers were incredibly enthusiastic,” she recalled.

Encouraged, she began to improvise. Flower petals floated through the air as the spotlight followed her every gesture. Freed from the tightly choreographed structure of the traditional stage, she discovered a more spontaneous and intimate side of her artistry.

The chemistry that she has found with her new audiences is becoming a trend in this field.

During a livestream of Poetic Dance: The Journey of a Legendary Landscape Painting, a dancer slowly turned her face toward the camera. The movement would barely have registered from the back rows of a theater, but on a phone screen, the lingering glance filled the frame. Within minutes, the audience had swelled to tens of thousands.

While some critics and traditionalists worry that the intimacy of the screen may flatten the grandeur of the stage, the dancers see the medium differently. Meng Qingyang, the production’s lead performer, calls livestreaming “a convenient aesthetic experience” that fits naturally into modern life.

“Attending the theater requires calculation — scheduling the time, navigating the commute after work,” she said. “Livestreaming allows people to experience the performance whenever they have a brief moment, lying comfortably at home after a long day.”

Yet convenience tells only part of the story.

What reaches viewers is often more than a dance. The Poetic Dance, a widely acclaimed dance drama, unfolds like the 900-year-old handscroll that inspired it. Mineral blues and greens shimmer against the warm patina of aged silk, while dancers move with the measured grace of ink brushstrokes gliding across a landscape.

Beneath its beauty lies an aesthetic shaped over centuries — one that finds strength in restraint, grandeur in simplicity, and meaning in the empty spaces as much as in the painted ones.

A Beijing resident, unable to secure a ticket for the Poetic Dance, decided to experience the performance on her phone.

“We Chinese people,” she said, “come from landscapes like these.”

The comment points to a broader shift in the way younger Chinese are engaging with tradition, said Li Mingchong, a research fellow at the Guangzhou Academy of Social Sciences.

Raised during a period of growing prosperity and global influence, many of them are comfortable looking outward, while also returning to cultural forms that have shaped the country’s collective memory, he said.

According to the China Association of Performing Arts, livestreams featuring multiple performers generated more than 15 billion yuan (about 2.1 billion U.S. dollars) in revenue in 2025.

By June, 57 professional performing arts troupes had launched regular livestreaming programs on Douyin, China’s version of TikTok, staging more than 16,000 broadcasts that attracted roughly 320 million views.

THE STAGE IN THE PALM

“The dancing seems professional, but I don’t get it.”

The comment lingered with Huang Xiaoyu, who operates livestreaming programs at Shaanxi Song and Dance Theater in Xi’an, a city in northwest China known for the rich legacies of the Tang Dynasty (618-907).

When the troupe first streamed one of its signature productions, the performers expected the artistry to speak for itself. But the response was underwhelming. Viewers drifted in and out within minutes, and audience numbers remained stubbornly low.

Huang realized that livestreaming was not simply about pointing a camera at a stage.

A sweeping formation that fills a stage can lose its impact on a handheld screen. Details, rhythm and interaction are key to keeping viewers engaged, said Wan Linrong, who oversees livestreaming at the China Oriental Performing Arts Group. The group is one of the production teams behind the Poetic Dance.

That realization prompted professional companies to rethink almost everything, from music and choreography to costumes and lighting, to create a visual language native to the vertical frame.

The challenge extended beyond artistic adaptation. As the camera magnified every movement, facial expression and flicker of emotion, such immediate exposure could be intimidating, even for seasoned professionals.

“At first, I was so nervous that my face literally twitched while I was dancing,” said Wang Lan, a dancer with the Shaanxi troupe.

Broadcast after broadcast, she found her footing through practice and encouragement from viewers. She hopes that, years from now, she will look back and know she didn’t spend her youth blending into the background. Instead, she stepped forward when the opportunity arose and gave it everything she had.

For many people, livestreaming has quietly reshaped careers. Its combination of stage shows and real-time audience interaction is making choreographers, camera operators and livestream directors increasingly sought-after roles in the industry.

At the Shaanxi troupe, a piece of music composed by a member of its livestream team was later featured on China’s state broadcaster CCTV. The composer said he stayed up all night watching the broadcast, replaying the moment after seeing his name appear in the credits.

For performing arts companies, livestreaming strips away some of the barriers of cost, distance and formality that can keep their performances out of reach. It also allows companies to build followings between shows: performers can explain the stories behind their work, share behind-the-scenes footage and give audiences a glimpse of how performances take shape.

That relationship can sometimes lead viewers back to the theater. Within 20 days of launching its livestreaming program in May, an opera and dance ensemble in east China’s Jiangsu Province saw its individual broadcasts surpass 1 million impressions. During the May Day holiday, the online popularity helped sell out performances at the theater.

The arrival of professional performing arts companies is also reshaping livestreaming itself. The multi-performer format is still in its early stages, with some livestreams relying on suggestive banter, competitive challenges and punishment games to attract views and rewards.

Industry figures suggest that virtual gifting in professional arts livestreams often grows faster than in ordinary entertainment broadcasts. This trend indicates that viewers may place greater value on craftsmanship than on spectacle.

To He Mu, the value of livestreaming goes beyond views and virtual gifts. It has created a deeper connection between performers and the audience, bringing them together through art as well as through everyday moments of exchange.

Viewers return day after day, asking about the meaning of a piece of music or a stage image. Some notice when her knee hurts and remind her to rest. Their curiosity and support have encouraged her to move beyond interpreting others’ creations and begin creating and sharing her own.

She still longs to return to the theater — to its lights, its stage and the immersive experience of performing a work polished over months, or even years. Her ideal, she said, is to perform onstage while continuing to livestream with the troupe.

For her, the stage has not disappeared. “It has simply expanded.” ■

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The historic site, which dates back to the 5th century AD, witnessed a dialogue between civilizations when Chinese President Xi Jinping visited there during his state visit to Mexico more than a decade ago.

In June 2013, Xi and his wife, Peng Liyuan, toured the site located on Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, accompanied by then Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto and his wife.

As they walked through the site, including the Pyramid of Kukulkan, the Great Ball Court and the Temple of the Warriors, Xi listened closely to explanations of Maya history and culture.

He asked about the meanings behind the patterns carved on the ruins and showed interest in similarities between certain Maya cultural elements and Chinese traditions, including imagery associated with the dragon.

The encounter reflected a simple yet profound idea — civilizations may differ in their histories and traditions, but they can learn from and enrich one another through dialogue and mutual respect.

“Different cultures and civilizations, while retaining their uniqueness, should tolerate and coexist with each other with an open-minded attitude so as to achieve common development and prosperity,” Xi said.

Over the years, the Chinese president has always called for seeking wisdom and drawing strength from different civilizations, while joining forces with others to tackle the common challenges facing humanity.

“There is a prospect greater than the sea, and it is the sky; there is a prospect greater than the sky, and it is the human soul,” Xi quoted Victor Hugo, a prominent French writer, as saying in his landmark United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) speech in Paris in 2014. “Indeed, we need a mind broader than the sky as we approach different civilizations.”

The visit to Chichen Itza was one example of Xi’s broader vision for exchanges among civilizations. In Paris, Xi shared stories of mutual learning between Eastern and Western civilizations.

“China’s Four Great Inventions, namely, papermaking, gunpowder, movable-type printing and the compass, led to changes in the world, including the European Renaissance. China’s philosophy, literature, medicine, silk, porcelain and tea reached the West and became part of people’s daily life,” he said.

These examples show that exchanges among civilizations are not a one-way process, but a source of progress driven by mutual learning.

“It is my keenly-felt conviction that an attitude of equality and modesty is required if one wants to truly understand the various civilizations,” he said.

“Taking a condescending attitude toward a civilization can not help anyone to appreciate its essence but may risk antagonizing it. Both history and reality show that pride and prejudice are the two biggest obstacles to exchanges and mutual learning among civilizations,” he added.

This approach has also been reflected in Xi’s diplomatic journeys around the world, where encounters with different cultures have become an important part of his visits.

In Trinidad and Tobago, he played the steelpan with local musicians. In Fiji, he listened to indigenous songs wearing a traditional Bula shirt. In Uzbekistan, he visited the ancient city of Bukhara, known as the “living fossil of the Silk Road.”

In Bukhara, Xi’s respect for local traditions left a lasting impression on Anvar Kurbanov, a master craftsman from the ancient city.

“I still remember President Xi watching the displayed handicrafts very intently. I could feel his heartfelt desire to understand and respect our culture,” Kurbanov said, recalling Xi’s visit to the city in 2016. “Ever since that visit, a growing number of Chinese tourists have come to Bukhara.”

In recent years, China has stepped up efforts to promote closer understanding and mutual appreciation among different civilizations. It has held cultural and tourism exchange programs, carried out joint archaeological research and promoted translations of classic works with countries including Russia and Egypt.

It has also hosted the Conference on Dialogue of Asian Civilizations and the Dialogue on Exchanges and Mutual Learning among Civilizations, and proposed the Global Civilization Initiative to contribute Chinese insights to bolster exchanges and mutual learning among civilizations.

On various international occasions, Xi has elaborated on the principles of harmony in diversity, inclusiveness and mutual learning, stressing that every country has the right to choose a development path suited to its own national conditions and the needs of its people.

“I have often emphasized that China’s goal is to be a great learning nation. We must avoid complacency and self-importance. Instead, we must be modest and humble, study hard and keep enhancing our capabilities,” Xi said in a speech at the Indian Council of World Affairs in New Delhi, India, in 2014.

“It is such a learning spirit featuring humility and inclusiveness that has enabled the Chinese nation to make continuous progress for thousands of years,” he added.■

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Xi’s Album | Xi holds talks with Slovak president in Beijing

Source: Xinhua

Editor: huaxia

2026-07-28 16:24:16

BEIJING, (Xinhua) — Chinese President Xi Jinping held talks with Slovak President Peter Pellegrini in Beijing on Tuesday.

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On Saturday, the Jingdezhen Handicraft Porcelain Industry Sites were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List, marking global recognition of a living tradition that remains a treasured gem of Chinese civilization.

The inscription also reflects China’s years of efforts to preserve and make alive this centuries-old craft — a cause that Chinese President Xi Jinping has consistently championed.

PASSING ON

Porcelain has been widely taken as one of the most representative symbol of Chinese civilization. For years, Xi has remained deeply committed to China’s cultural heritage and emphasized its preservation as a way to promote the finest traditional Chinese culture.

In October 2023, Xi visited Jingdezhen, globally renowned as the “Porcelain Capital,” where the glow of kiln fires has illuminated 2,000 years of ceramic history. At the Taoyangli Historical and Cultural Block, he toured the Nanlu Ruins, the Ceramic Museum, and the Ming and Qing Dynasty (1368-1911) kiln complex, learning about the intricate processes and cultural legacy behind the city’s celebrated porcelain craft.

During the visit, Xi met Sun Lixin, a fourth-generation craftsman carrying forward his family’s porcelain-making tradition. Admiring the craftsmanship, Xi asked, “Do you paint according to a design, or do you rely on your sense of touch?”

“It’s all in my heart,” Sun replied.

“Devoting one’s entire life to a single craft, with generations of a family committed to the same pursuit, is no simple undertaking,” Xi said.

“The fine traditional culture passed down by our ancestors is something we must continue to hold in our hands, adapt to the times, and carry forward,” he added.

Xi’s long-standing commitment to preserving Chinese porcelain culture can be traced back to his years working in east China’s Zhejiang province in the early 2000s, when he placed great importance on protecting and promoting the country’s rich ceramic heritage.

Xi made several visits to Longquan, a city in southwestern Zhejiang known for its centuries-old celadon tradition. He emphasized that Longquan celadon was a Chinese cultural treasure and called for the establishment of a museum to preserve and showcase this valuable heritage.

In 2009, the museum was officially opened. That same year, the traditional firing techniques of Longquan celadon were inscribed on UNESCO’s Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

Longquan would become one illustration of a much broader agenda. Over the years, Xi has made cultural heritage protection a recurring theme of his domestic inspections, visiting sites ranging from the Forbidden City and the Grand Canal to Jiayuguan Pass and the Yin Ruins. With his push, more Chinese cultural sites have been added to UNESCO’s World Heritage List.

“Protecting, preserving and making good use of these invaluable treasures is our shared responsibility,” Xi once said. “It is also essential to ensuring the continuity of human civilization and advancing sustainable development around the world.”

TRAVERSING CIVILIZATIONS

Beyond its artistic value, porcelain has long served as a bridge fostering mutual learning among civilizations. Through the ancient Silk Road, porcelain vases, jars and bowls adorned the royal courts of Europe, becoming collectors’ highly coveted items.

For Xi, porcelain is more than a craft; it is a cultural ambassador that carries China’s artistic traditions and civilizational heritage to the world. From presenting porcelain as state gifts to foreign dignitaries to showcasing historic masterpieces at major international gatherings, Xi has used the timeless art form to tell the story of China’s rich cultural legacy.

In May 2019, Xi highlighted a rare Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) blue-and-white porcelain vase to foreign leaders while touring a cultural exhibition ahead of the Conference on Dialogue of Asian Civilizations held in Beijing.

He noted that very few blue-and-white porcelain vases from the Yuan Dynasty have survived, describing the precious artifact as “the panda of ceramics.”

Xi, on many occasions, has also used porcelain to illustrate the transformative power of exchanges between civilizations. In a signed article published ahead of his state visit to Portugal in 2018, Xi wrote, “China’s blue and white porcelain, which was first shipped to Portugal centuries ago, inspired a fusion of Chinese and local techniques, producing a unique form of art Azulejo.”

Chinese ceramics have had a wide influence on art throughout the world and the artistic trends in the West, like Europe, and other places, said Jad Tabet, a Franco-Lebanese architect and former representative to the UNESCO World Heritage Committee.

The enduring vitality of China’s ceramic art and the global growth of the porcelain industry offer a vivid example of how civilizational exchange can promote common development and progress. As Xi once noted in a speech at UNESCO headquarters, civilizations have become richer and more colorful with exchanges and mutual learning.

“Such exchanges and mutual learning form an important drive for human progress and global peace and development,” he said.■

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The world’s second-largest economy has operated within an appropriate range, and the fundamentals of economic operation remain unchanged. Wednesday’s official data showed China’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew 4.7 percent year on year in the first half of 2026 (H1). The figures also pointed to solid foreign trade performance, expanding new growth drivers and continued economic resilience.

The International Monetary Fund, meanwhile, recently lowered its forecast for global economic growth this year to 3 percent, while raising its projection for China’s full-year growth by 0.2 percentage points to 4.6 percent, making China one of the few major economies to receive an upward revision.

Behind the growth figures lies an economy that is becoming increasingly driven by innovation and industrial upgrading. New growth drivers contributed more than 40 percent of economic growth in H1, with high-end manufacturing, digital economy and modern services continuing to expand.

In the first six months of this year, the value-added output of high-tech manufacturing climbed 13.3 percent. Imports and exports of computing hardware, such as electronic components and computer parts, jumped 56.6 percent to 5.13 trillion yuan (over 757 billion U.S. dollars). AI-powered products, green low-carbon goods and high-end equipment also recorded strong export growth.

The strong performance of China’s new export pillars, including new energy vehicles, photovoltaic products and lithium batteries, has contributed to the global green transition. Technological innovation and large-scale manufacturing have helped lower the cost of clean energy technologies worldwide, making the energy transition more affordable for many countries.

China’s resilience is also supported by the continued recovery of domestic demand and the country’s commitment to high-level opening-up.

The total retail sales of goods and services, a major indicator of the country’s consumption strength, increased by 2.7 percent year on year, reflecting a steadily improving consumer market.

At the same time, China’s role as a major global market continued to expand. China has remained the world’s second-largest import market for 17 consecutive years. Data from the General Administration of Customs also showed that foreign trade growth became more balanced, with imports rising 22.1 percent to 10.74 trillion yuan (1.59 trillion dollars) in H1, 8.7 percentage points faster than exports.

Such growth not only allows countries around the world to benefit from China’s expanding market, but also supports the diversification of global value and supply chains and helps create a more stable environment for international trade.

In today’s deeply interconnected world, the significance of China’s economic performance extends far beyond its borders. China’s steady growth, industrial upgrading, technological progress and high-level opening-up are providing the global economy with much-needed stability, demand and innovation.

Challenges facing the global economy are unlikely to disappear anytime soon. Yet China’s commitment to high-quality development, technological innovation and high-standard opening-up provides a solid foundation for sustainable growth.

As these strengths continue to unfold, China will remain an important contributor to global economic stability and a reliable partner in promoting shared prosperity. ■

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“All countries should take a people-centered approach and develop AI for the positive and for good. We should ensure that AI is an important driver for shared prosperity and common security,” Xi said while addressing the opening ceremony of the 2026 World AI Conference (WAIC) and High-Level Meeting on Global AI Governance in Shanghai.

China is a global leader in AI development. In 2025, its core AI industries were worth over 1.2 trillion yuan (about 176.6 billion U.S. dollars), while the number of AI enterprises nationwide exceeded 6,200.

The country’s open-source large AI models have been downloaded more than 10 billion times in total, continuing to create new and broader opportunities for global cooperation in AI innovation.

The world has entered an unprecedented period of active innovation on AI technologies, Xi said in his keynote address. He raised questions about how humans can get along with thinking machines, how security can be ensured when algorithm is part of decision-making, how ethical challenges by technologies can be tackled through adaptive governance, and how AI for all can be realized when the divide keeps widening.

“These questions demand serious consideration and real answers from the whole international community,” he said.

Xi stressed the need for adhering to the principles of openness and win-win and boosting innovation-driven development, strengthening risk-awareness and ensuring that AI is secure and controllable, encouraging inclusiveness and promoting mutual learning between civilizations, and advocating solidarity and improving global governance.

“We should jointly oppose overstretching the national security concept in the field of AI and placing one country’s security over that of others,” he said.

The important role of the United Nations should be recognized in global AI governance, Xi noted, calling for enhancing alignment and coordination on AI development strategies, governance rules and technical standards.

“We must carry out extensive international cooperation and help Global South countries with capacity building to bridge the AI and digital divides, promote sustainable development, and prevent creating new historical injustice in AI,” he said.

As a responsible major country, China is always committed to providing international public goods relating to AI, said Xi, who proposed the Global AI Governance Initiative in 2023.

The country has also provided Chinese solutions for global AI governance through various efforts, including the launch of the AI Capacity-Building Action Plan for Good and for All and the AI Plus International Cooperation Initiative.

“AI development should not be a solo performance by a single country, but a symphony of international cooperation,” said the Chinese president.

The establishment of the WAICO, Xi said, is a major move by China to answer the call of the Global South and unite the international community together to promote vigorously AI development and governance. “It will be an important milestone in the history of AI development,” he said. Twenty-nine countries have signed the agreement on the organization’s creation as its founding members.

To further advance global AI capacity building, China will provide developing countries with 5,000 opportunities in AI training and seminar programs in the next five years, Xi pledged.

China will develop international AI application cooperation centers with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the League of Arab States, the African Union, the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and BRICS. It will also enable 30 countries to use the AI-powered meteorological warning system, known as MAZU, to safeguard homes around the world, Xi said.

China has hosted the WAIC annually since 2018 as a key platform to forge global AI partnerships to unlock AI’s benefits for all. Themed “AI Partnership for a Brighter Future,” this year’s event includes more than 140 forums, bringing together 1,400 guests from home and abroad.

Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet, Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul and Secretary-General of the United Nations Antonio Guterres delivered speeches at the opening ceremony.

Speaking highly of China’s contribution to advancing global AI governance, they said the opportunities and challenges brought by AI know no borders and should be seized and addressed by all parties.

They expressed confidence that the WAICO will play an important role to this end. ■

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