(1927.12.19-) Vice Minister, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, People's Republic ofChina(1984.8-1989.10)

Born inYixing,JiangsuProvince, Zhu Qizhen graduated fromSt. JohnUniversityin 1948. After joining Ministry of Foreign Affairs in November 1949, he held a series of positions, including Deputy Director of the General Office, Second Secretary and First Secretary in the Chinese Embassy in Egypt, Director and Deputy Director General(1972-1973) of the Department of West-Asian and North-African Affairs, Counsellor for Political Affairs in the Chinese Embassy in Australia (1973-1977), Deputy Director General and Director General of the Department of Affairs of North America and Oceania (1977-1982), and Assistant Foreign Minister and Director General of the Department of Affairs of North America and Oceania concurrently (1983.1-1984.8). In his tenure of vice-foreign minister, he was in charge of the work of Department of Affairs ofNorth AmericaandOceania, Department of Latin American Affairs, andDepartment of Treaty and Law. He paid a lot of visits to countries inNorth America,Latin AmericaandOceania, and had regular talks at the level of vice-foreign minister with such countries as theUS,Canada,Brazil,Australia,New Zealand, etc. He attended the negotiations of the establishment of the diplomatic relations betweenChinaand theUS, and of the Joint Communiqué of theUnited States of Americaand the People's Republic ofChinaonAugust 17, 1982. In 1979, he accompanied Deng Xiaoping in the latter's visit to theUS. Later on, he accompanied the government and Party leaders, such as Hu Yaobang, Zhao Ziyang, and Yang Shangkun, in their visits to five countries of Oceania and the South Pacific Ocean, four countries of South America, the US, Canada, and Korea, etc. On behalf of the Chinese Government, he negotiated withFijiand signed the Joint Communiqué of the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations between the two countries (1975); He negotiated and initialed the joint communiqués on the establishment of diplomatic relations respectively withPapua New Guinea(1976) andUruguay(1987). In August 1988, he led the Chinese government delegation to attend the ceremony of handover of the presidential power ofEcuador. He was awarded decorations by the governments of theUnited Arab Republic(Egypttoday),ChileandUruguay. From 1989 to 1993, he was Ambassador to theUS. From 1993 to 1997, he was member of the Standing Committee of the 8thNational People's Congress and deputy director of the Committee of Foreign Affairs. During this period, he attended eight conferences of the Inter-Parliamentary Union in the capacity of head of the delegation of the National People's Congress.