I would like to first of all thank the organizers for this memorial meeting, as I was one of those who strongly believe that we need a meeting in memory of professor Ezra Vogel, a great scholar who devoted his whole life in helping people understand Asia, Japan and China in particular.

As many of the speakers have said today, he was a greatscholar deserving our greatrespect and admiration for his academic accomplishments, contributions and his noble mission for a better world. This is highly relevant today, as we are seeing the deteriorating China-US relations in the last several years. I do believe we need more scholars, both in China and the US, who can, just like Professor Vogel did, genuinely understand each other's culture, history, values, objectively see each other’s merits and demerits, know how to learn from each other and respect each other and do what they can to help bridge the gap of understanding of each other. This is so important today.

I remember what Professor Vogel said, during a recent interview with James Chau in the program calledThe Pacific Dialogue, that he had a strong wish. He said, “I’m much hopeful that if we get a new president in January, we can begin to try to pull the relations back to a better one”. Now the new US president will soon be sworn in and tomorrow we will be watching the inauguration ceremony of the new US president, Joe Biden, in the White House. But people will be watching more than that. People will be watching what changes this new US administration brings to the US, to the world, and for us in particular, to the US-China relations. My point is, maybe we should not expect too much and too quick, but we do need a sense of urgency to start more meetings and dialogues so as to reset or re-calibrate our relations to a more normal and healthy track. I think this is what Professor Vogel has wished, and what we need to follow with more determined efforts. Thank you.