Beijing Jazz Festival

On 15 September 2019, Solomon Islands parliament voted to change the country's diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China; diplomatic recognition of either Taiwan or China is mutually exclusive. On 21 September 2019 Solomon Islands and the People's Republic of China issued a joint communiqué establishing relations. An exchange of ambassadors on both sides is yet to be made.

The Huairen Hall or Huairentang (simplified Chinese: 怀仁堂; traditional Chinese: 懷仁堂) is a building inside Zhongnanhai, the Chinese government's leadership compound in Beijing. It has been the site of several major events in Chinese history. Huairen Hall is the main meeting place of the Politburo of the Communist party of China and an alternate meeting place of the Standing Committee. The building is also the meeting location of several of the Communist Party's leading groups such as the Financial and Economic Affairs Leading Group and the Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms.

Zhongnanhai (Chinese: 中南海) is a compound that houses the offices of and serves as a residence for the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and central government. It was a former imperial garden, and is located adjacent to the Forbidden Palace in Beijing. The term Zhongnanhai is often used as a metonym for China’s central government and its leadership at large. The state leaders, including the president, general secretary of the CCP, and other top CCP and PRC leadership figures carry out many of their day-to-day administrative activities inside the compound, such as meetings with foreign dignitaries. China Central Television (CCTV) frequently shows footage of meetings inside the compound, but limits its coverage largely to views of the interior of buildings. Though numerous maps of the complex exist from before the founding of the People's Republic of China, the interior layout of Zhongnanhai has been altered significantly since then, including a wave of major renovations in the 1970s. Today many buildings share the names of older, pre-PRC structures, but have completely changed in layout and purpose. The complex is divided into two main sections, reflecting the parallel authority of the highest level of state and party institutions in the country. North Zhongnanhai is used as the headquarters of the State Council and includes the offices of its senior most leaders as well as its principal meeting rooms. South Zhongnanhai is the headquarters of the CCP Central Committee, including its staff and its highest level coordinating institutions, such as the Standing Committee, Politburo and Secretariat. The current basic outline of Zhongnanhai emerged during the Ming dynasty when the southernmost of the two lakes in the complex was created in 1421. By the late Qing Dynasty, Zhongnanhai was used as the de facto center of government, with Empress Dowager Cixi and later Prince Regent Chun building residences there instead of the Forbidden City. After the establishment of the Republic of China, the new president, Yuan Shikai remodeled Zhongnanhai to become the formal center of what would become known as the Beiyang Government. In 1949, CCP Chairman Mao Zedong moved into the complex after the establishment of the People's Republic of China. Mao received many important foreign leaders in Zhongnanhai, including Nikita Khrushchev, Che Guevara, Richard Nixon, Georges Pompidou, Kakuei Tanaka and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, among others. Mao's favorite places in Zhongnanhai were the Library of Chrysanthemum Fragrance (his personal residence, filled with bookshelves) and the Poolside House, next to the large indoor swimming pool, where he would spend much of the day swimming or reading books and reports by the pool. After Mao's death, the Chrysanthemum Library along with many of his belongings was preserved as a museum which is not accessible to the general public.

The Palace of Eternal Spring (simplified Chinese: 长春宫; traditional Chinese: 長春宮; pinyin: Chǎngchūngōng), also known as Changchun Palace, is one of the Six Western Palaces in the inner court of the Forbidden City. It is situated north of the Hall of the Supreme Principle, west of the Palace of Earthly Honour and northwest of the Palace of Eternal Longevity.

The Hall of Mental Cultivation (simplified Chinese: 养心殿; traditional Chinese: 養心殿; pinyin: Yǎngxīn Diàn, Manchu: ᠶᠠᠩ ᠰᡳᠨ ᡩᡳᠶᠠᠨ yang sin diyan) is a building in the inner courtyard of the Forbidden City in Beijing, China. The hall is a wooden structure with dome coffered ceilings, and was first built during the Ming dynasty in 1537, and was reconstructed during the Qing dynasty. During the early Qing dynasty under the reign of the Kangxi Emperor the hall was mostly used as a workshop, wherein artisan objects like clocks were designed and manufactured. From the reign of the Yongzheng Emperor during the 18th century, the hall was the residence for the emperor. Under the reign of the Qianlong Emperor until the fall of the Qing dynasty, the hall became the centre of governance and political administration. In the Western Warmth Chamber, the emperor would hold private meetings, and discuss state affairs with his mandarins. After the death of Emperor Xianfeng, from inside the Eastern Warmth Chamber, empress dowagers Ci'an and Cixi would hold audiences with ministers and rule from behind a silk screen curtain during their regencies for emperors Tongzhi and Guangxu, who both succeeded to the throne as children in the second half of the 19th century.The Hall of Mental Cultivation contained the Hall of Three Rarities, which stored art and cultural relics, and the Qianlong Emperor's collection of 134 model calligraphy works from the Imperial Collection. He also housed three ancient calligraphy artworks by ancient calligraphers Wang Xizhi, Wang Xianzhi and Wang Xun.The hall's interior is decorated with polychrome paintings, glazed tiles, ancient thangkas, and traditional wax paper decorations. From 2006, the Palace Museum instigated a research and conservation project aimed at restoring the hall, and preserving its cultural relics like thangkas.In anticipation of the hall's closure due to restoration in 2018, in 2017 the Palace Museum launched a digital exhibition about the Hall of Mental Cultivation.

The Palace of Universal Happiness (simplified Chinese: 咸福宫; traditional Chinese: 鹹福宮; pinyin: Xiánfúgōng), also known as Xianfu Palace, is one of the Six Western Palaces in the inner court of the Forbidden City. It is situated north of the Palace of Eternal Spring, east of the Palace of Gathering Elegance and northwest of the Palace of Earthly Honour.

The All-China Federation of Supply and Marketing Cooperatives (Chinese: 中华全国供销合作总社) is a joint organization of the national supply and marketing Cooperatives of China, led by the State Council, with an administrative level of ministerial level. It is a member of the International Cooperative Alliance (ICA).

The Palace of Eternal Longevity (simplified Chinese: 永寿宫; traditional Chinese: 永壽宮; pinyin: Yŏngshòugōng), also known as Yongshou Palace, is one of the Six Western Palaces in the inner court of the Forbidden City. It is the closest residence to the Hall of Mental Cultivation, the living quarters of the Qing emperors since 1722.

The Palace of Earthly Honour (Chinese: 翊坤宫; pinyin: Yìkūngōng), also known as Yikun Palace, is one of the Six Western Palaces in the inner court of the Forbidden City. It is situated north of the Palace of Eternal Longevity, south of the Palace of Gathering Elegance, east of the Palace of Eternal Spring, northeast of the Hall of the Supreme Principle and southeast of the Palace of Universal Happiness.

The Yuan dynasty (Chinese: 元朝; pinyin: Yuáncháo), officially the Great Yuan (Chinese: 大元; pinyin: Dà Yuán; Mongolian: ᠶᠡᠬᠡᠶᠤᠸᠠᠨᠤᠯᠤᠰ, Yeke Yuwan Ulus, literally "Great Yuan State"), was a Mongol-led imperial dynasty of China and a successor state to the Mongol Empire after its division. It was established by Kublai (Emperor Shizu), the fifth khagan-emperor of the Mongol Empire from the Borjigin clan, and lasted from 1271 to 1368. In Chinese historiography, the Yuan dynasty followed the Song dynasty and preceded the Ming dynasty. Although Genghis Khan had been enthroned with the Han-style title of Emperor in 1206 and the Mongol Empire had ruled territories including modern-day northern China for decades, it was not until 1271 that Kublai Khan officially proclaimed the dynasty in the traditional Han style, and the conquest was not complete until 1279 when the Southern Song dynasty was defeated in the Battle of Yamen. His realm was, by this point, isolated from the other Mongol-led khanates and controlled most of modern-day China and its surrounding areas, including modern-day Mongolia. It was the first dynasty founded by a non-Han ethnicity that ruled all of China proper. In 1368, following the defeat of the Yuan forces by the Ming dynasty, the Genghisid rulers retreated to the Mongolian Plateau and continued to rule until 1635 when they surrendered to the Later Jin dynasty (which later evolved into the Qing dynasty). The rump state is known in historiography as the Northern Yuan dynasty.Some of the Yuan emperors mastered the Chinese language, while others only used their native Mongolian language and the 'Phags-pa script.After the division of the Mongol Empire, the Yuan dynasty was the khanate ruled by the successors of Möngke. In official Chinese histories, the Yuan dynasty bore the Mandate of Heaven. The dynasty was established by Kublai Khan, yet he placed his grandfather Genghis Khan on the imperial records as the official founder of the dynasty and accorded him the temple name Taizu. In the edict titled Proclamation of the Dynastic Name issued in 1271, Kublai announced the name of the new dynasty as Great Yuan and claimed the succession of former Chinese dynasties from the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors to the Tang dynasty.In addition to Emperor of China, Kublai also claimed the title of Great Khan, supreme over the other successor khanates: the Chagatai, the Golden Horde, and the Ilkhanate. As such, the Yuan was also sometimes referred to as the Empire of the Great Khan. However, while the claim of supremacy by the Yuan emperors was at times recognized by the western khans, their subservience was nominal and each continued its own separate development.

The Hall of Central Harmony (Chinese: 中和殿; pinyin: Zhōng Hé Diàn; Manchu: ᡩᡠᠯᡳᠮᠪᠠ ᡳ ᡥᡡᠸᠠᠯᡳᠶᠠᠮᠪᡠᡵᡝ ᡩᡝᠶᡝᠨ dulimba-i hūwaliyambure deyen) is one of the three halls of the Outer Court of the Forbidden City, in Beijing, China, along with the Hall of Supreme Harmony and Hall of Preserving Harmony. It is smaller than the other two halls, and is square in shape. It was used by the Emperor to prepare and rest before and during ceremonies.

The Hall of Preserving Harmony (Chinese: 保和殿; pinyin: Bǎo Hé Diàn; Manchu: ᡝᠨᡨᡝᡥᡝᠮᡝ ᡥᡡᠸᠠᠯᡳᠶᠠᠮᠪᡠᡵᡝ ᡩᡝᠶᡝᠨ enteheme hūwaliyambure deyen) is one of the three halls of the Outer Court of the Forbidden City in Beijing, China, along with the Hall of Supreme Harmony and Hall of Central Harmony. Rectangular in plan, the Hall of Preserving Harmony is similar to, but smaller in scale than, the Hall of Supreme Harmony. It was used for rehearsing ceremonies, and was also the site of the final stage of the Imperial examination. Both of these halls also feature imperial thrones, though to a slightly smaller scale than that in the Hall of Supreme Harmony.