DECLARING the just-ended overseas trip of President Jiang Zemin a success, China's official media yesterday emphasised good neighbourhood links while playing down such sensitive issues as border disputes with neighbouring India and Vietnam. Mr Jiang's return from the four-leg nation tour coincided with the trips of two senior party leaders - Politburo Standing Committee member Li Ruihuan to India and Politburo member Ding Guan'gen to Vietnam. Without mentioning the border dispute, Mr Ding said the visit to Vietnam was aimed at further strengthening co-operation between the two sides. Faced with similar tasks of boosting their economies and improving livelihood, the two ruling parties shared the need to have a peaceful and stable international environment, he said in a Xinhua (New China News Agency) report. Vietnam's Communist Party head, Du Moui, indicated that the nation would strive to facilitate friendly co-operation with China in its reform drive. In New Delhi, Mr Li, who chairs the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), emphasised that China badly needed a lasting and peaceful international environment for it to concentrate on economic development. China had attached importance to its South Asian links and would continue to enhance good neighbourhood ties, said Mr Li in the first overseas trip by a CPPCC head. The diplomatic overtures to India and Vietnam were a move by China to tie foreign affairs to economic liberalisation. Official news media, while giving prominent coverage of the diplomatic activities, also reflected a stronger effort by Beijing to introduce Mr Jiang as a statesman and man of the people. Grinning and gripping the hand of premier Li Peng, Mr Jiang was pictured on the front page of the official People's Daily yesterday, next to a congratulatory editorial titled: ''No matter near or far, we are all neighbours.'' State media also sought to show Mr Jiang as a man who can still roll up his shirtsleeves, important in a political culture that remains officially egalitarian. The People's Daily ran a colour story on Mr Jiang's plane trip home from Portugal detailing the President's karaoke serenade at 10,000 metres. Last night's state-run television also carried footage of the lighter moments of the flight. Mr Jiang sang selections from the 1950s revolutionary opera Red Lantern before leading the entire crew in Unity is Strength.
