China is sending Vice President Han Zheng to represent the country at UN General Assembly session

By HUIZHONG WU
Associated Press

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — China is sending Vice President Han Zheng to the U.N. General Assembly’s annual high-level debate. The announcement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Friday suggests the country’s most senior diplomat, Wang Yi, will not attend this year’s gathering of world leaders at United Nations headquarters in New York. It starts Monday with a sustainability summit. The general debate gets underway Tuesday. Chinese President Xi Jinping hasn’t attended the U.N. session in person for several years. He participated via video conference during the first two years of the coronavirus pandemic. Wang Yi attended last year and has generally represented China at the U.N. He’s the head of the foreign affairs committee of China’s Communist Party.