Rana Mitter, director of the University of Oxford China Centre

The international edition suggests an ambition by China to project its views to a wider global audience. There will be an interested audience for such views, and China Daily is showing the right spirit by covering a range of genuinely international topics. It is good to see China Daily showing ambition. To gain further traction, it would be good if China Daily considered the best way to get a wide range of views about China, including views different from the official ones.

The message from Minister Wang Yi suggests a useful way forward for China Daily. There is a great deal of global interest in China's foreign policy. China Daily could use its unique access to the Chinese system to ask frank, detailed and complex questions about China's foreign policy to the minister and others, and then relay answers to its readers.

Lord Anthony Giddens, former director of the London School of Economics and Political Science

Congrats on the new international edition, which looks very good to me. Yes, important to break away from purely national editions at this point, when the global society is so dislocated and turbulent on a political and economic level. The point about the problematic nature of world society is well made in Councilor Wang Yi's message. To me the most transformative force in the world society - bar none - is the digital revolution, which is not just 'technology' but a revolutionary force in all of our lives. He offers a clear mention of this.

Professor Peter Kagwanja, former Kenya government adviser and currently president and chief executive of Africa Policy Institute (Kenya)

A new Global Edition of China Daily might become the sharpest arrow in China's diplomatic quiver, enhancing its voice, leadership and soft power in global affairs.

Conceptually, the paper might be Beijing's boldest step in confronting the new challenge of “sharp power”-- perceptively described by the American think tank, National Endowment for Democracy, in a November 2017 article in the Foreign Affairs magazine.

Second, the daily opens a new avenue for factual communication as the fulcrum of diplomacy and a platform for fostering understanding among nations. It will promote the values of peace, shared growth, mutual respect, fairness, justice and win-win cooperation in our culturally diverse and globalize world, thus helping break the barriers of isolationism, protectionism and xenophobia.

Third, the daily coincides with Modern China's 70th anniversary, when Beijing will also host the second global Belt and Road Forum. On the whole, the daily, itself a significant step in China's realizing its first centenary goal of becoming a moderately prosperous society, is a wellspring of information and lessons on Beijing's pathway to progress to inspire Africa's dream and rise.