On the morning of April 12th, 2014, Mr. Dominique de Villepin, former Prime Minister of France, paid a visit to Peking University and delivered a speech about financial reform and the world credit rating system at the School of Economics.
Before the speech, Vice President of Peking University Li Yansong met the guests at the meeting room in the School of Economics, accompanied by Associate Dean of the School of Economics Zhang Zheng and Professor Du Liqun.
At first, Prof. Li Yansong warmly welcomed Mr. Dominique de Villepin and briefly introduced the history of PKU and the living and study conditions of foreign students’ especially French students in PKU. He also emphasized that PKU is a comprehensive university with broad disciplines.
They then looked back at the friendly communications between the two countries and Mr. Dominique de Villepin highlighted the significance of exchanges in education because the future of a nation lies in its youth. In addition, Prof. Zhang Zheng and Prof. Du Liqun introduced the history of the School of Economics and the research conducted with regard to the credit rating system. At the end of the meeting, Prof. Li invited Mr.Dominique de Villepin to attend the next Beijing Forum.
Then Mr. Dominique de Villepin delivered his fantastic speech with a profound insight into the economic world today. He believed that it’s time for us to wake up, to realize that financial instability has become a huge threat in the process of globalization. Later he stressed the fact that Asia is rising up and leading the way to fight for the world’s financial stability. But Asia is also faced with a lot of challenges, which constitutes the reason why we need to promote cooperation among different regions.
Mr. Dominique de Villepin put forward four key points of the financial reform, namely currency reform, cross-sectional reform, reform of overseas investment and reform of the rating system.
Followed by the speech was a brief interview between Mr. Dominique de Villepin and a student journalist He Yicheng. Mr. Dominique de Villepin expressed his views on the French-China relations, the prospect of cooperation between higher education institutions in the next decade and Yenching Academy Project which will be launched in May. Finally, Mr. Dominique de Villepin left a few words to inspire students in PKU to learn more, think more and explore more.
Written by Yuan Yating
