Dear Ambassador Chindawongse,

Ambassador Pieris,

Colleagues and friends,

It is my great pleasure to attend the commemoration of the International Day of Vesak. At the outset, please allow me to express my appreciation to the Permanent Mission of Thailand and Sri Lanka for hosting this event. I also convey my best wishes to everyone celebrating Vesak.

Vesak is not only an occasion to celebrate, but also a good opportunity to reflect on and gain strength from Buddha’s teachings. The world is now undergoing a series of intersecting crisis. At this critical juncture, it is imperative to learn from Buddha’s spirits of compassion, tolerance, harmony and equality, and reject racial discrimination, intolerance, xenophobia, and the mentality of “me first”, or supremacy of one group of people over the others. It is high time for us all to understand that we have a shared future and have to build it together.  

Mutual learning, dialogue among civilizations and people-to-people exchanges play a key role in addressing fundamental challenges of today's world. To this end, President Xi Jinping has recently proposed the Global Civilization Initiative. He called for respect the diversity of civilizations and the principles of equality, mutual learning, dialogue, and inclusivity, emphasized the importance of humanity’s common values like peace, development, equality, democracy, and freedom, advocated the inheritance and innovation of traditional cultures, and called for strengthening international people-to-people exchanges and foster mutual understanding. China stands ready to work with all partners to promote cultural and religious exchanges, and to promote common development, common security and common future for us all.

I thank you.