China unveils image-building ad in US for Hu visit

BEIJING: China has unveiled a 60-second promotional video on the huge screens in New York City's Times Square to coincide with President Hu Jintao's US visit this week -- a flashy bit of soft diplomacy.

The video -- which features basketball superstar Yao Ming, piano virtuoso Lang Lang and Chinese astronaut Yang Liwei -- aired for the first time late Monday.

Chinese state media said it will be shown 300 times a day for the next month.

The "Experience China" marketing clip, which also features ordinary Chinese, will air on news network CNN until February 13, the Xinhua news agency reported.

"The film is aimed at boosting and raising China's image as being prosperous, developing, democratic, progressive," the press office of the State Council, China's cabinet, said in August when the campaign was first announced, adding it was about presenting "China in a new era."

Hu is due to arrive in Washington on Tuesday for a visit that comes at a key moment in Sino-US relations, which have been dogged over the past year by everything from the yuan and trade disputes to human rights and Taiwan.

The Chinese leader will begin the visit with a private dinner on Tuesday in the White House residence hosted by US President Barack Obama.

Obama will then lay on the pageantry of a state visit on Wednesday, including talks in the Oval Office and a state dinner.