Politics in back seat at Shanghai meeting
Shanghai plays host to the Asian Development Bank annual meeting today and it can breathe a sigh of relief that it will not have to endure the circus of the last ADB gathering on the mainland.
The last ADB meeting in China was in May 1989 in Beijing, and it landed smack in the middle of a swelling tide of student demonstrations.
More ominously, it was an address by then-Communist Party leader Zhao Ziyang and his remarks to delegates that were used to undermine his position and eventually led to his replacement by Jiang Zemin.
Mr Zhao, who has been out of the public eye since his ousting in 1989, offered a more conciliatory line than paramount leader Deng Xiaoping on the student protests.
That was just some of the evidence of a split within the ruling party between those who wanted the country to open up and the conservatives who were deeply suspicious of the students and reform-minded opponents.
In the eyes of Mr Zhao's political opponents, the former Communist Party leader later compounded his errors by telling the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev something that everyone in China knew - that it was Deng who still made key decisions.
President and Communist Party chief Jiang Zemin is scheduled to address the ADB meeting today but this time there is no hint of controversy.
Shanghai is the venue and it is a city that leaves the politics to Beijing.
Moreover, Shanghai is more likely to upstage the gathering than be overshadowed by it. About 3,200 people are registered to attend the 35th meeting of the bank's board of governors - far more than usual.
ADB officials concede that it is probably Shanghai - and not just the bank proceedings - that they have come to see.
Once again, Shanghai will be able to use an international gathering to showcase its impressive economic achievements. During the three-day event, it will make a somewhat more modest replay of the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation forum which it hosted last year.
While it will not have to worry about providing security for numerous heads of state, it has its senior leader and many financial officials from abroad.
Shanghai is not taking any chances that the ADB delegates will go away with the wrong impression. Banners and billboards have suddenly appeared around major highways in the city.
Traffic will be restricted during the conference so that delegates can arrive at venues safely and on time. The city will even shut down some of the tunnels that cross the Huangpu River.
Delegates will discuss the Asian economic situation, regional co-operation, efforts to reduce poverty and reconstruction in Afghanistan, according to ADB president Tadao Chino.
China's rapid economic growth is also likely to be highlighted as it has already been a focus of the seminars ahead of the formal sessions.
Meanwhile, China is expected to ask the bank for more credit to help fund its infrastructure spending this year. It will ask for US$1.25 billion this year compared with US$997 million last year, according to ADB officials.
