Known as "panda diplomacy," China has long been sending its pandas as gifts to other countries as a sign of friendship. [...] We chart the course of Jia Jia's life in parallel with the extraordinary changes in China over the past four decades.

One state media take veered dangerously close to racism: on July 24, the day Obama arrived in Kenya’s capital city Nairobi, the English language website of state-run outlet Global Times ran a cartoon titled “Homecoming,” portraying the president wearing what appeared to be tribal attire and carrying a spear near a herd of zebra on an open plain.

Iran in the new era began its attempts to resolve it through new diplomacy tools based on maximum engagement, as well as employing a new rhetoric based on a “patience-oriented, friendly approach” towards diplomacy, which in many ways helped to harmonize and reconcile inconsistencies between its foreign policy and public diplomacy.

Publishing group Pearson announced the sale of the Financial Times Group to Japanese media firm Nikkei, a move that caused concern among many Chinese. The Financial Times has been one of the most influential Western media outlets in its coverage of Chinese business. Moreover, compared to other Western outlets, the newspaper has a friendly relationship with the the Chinese government.

For more than a month, students at the prestigious Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) have been on strike. The FTII is one of numerous institutions of higher learning funded by the government. 

Ambassador of China to Italy Li Ruiyu highlighted the most recent example of fruitful bilateral exchange, the Expo Milano 2015, which since its opening on May 1 has hosted a series of important Chinese events, from the China National Day to the Beijing Week, Shanghai Week and many other activities organized by different regions of China.