It was early fall, 1959. A senior official from Mao’s China was leading a mission to Kyiv, then part of the Soviet Union. He inspected factories, learned about state planning, and took an afternoon boat trip on the Dnipro River with his 30-plus comrades. It’s nothing like the Ukraine his son has to deal with today.
Xi Zhongxun, father of the current Chinese President Xi Jinping, led the visit. As secretary-general of the State Council, the government arm of the Communist Party, Xi the senior spent a total of four days in what is now Ukraine’s capital. The trip also took him to Moscow and Prague, and apparently left a mark on the boy who would one day run the only powerful Communist Party left standing on earth.
