Lee Kuan Yew to meet Jiang

Lee Kuan Yew to meet Jiang

BEIJING (Reuter): Singapore's patriarch Lee Kuan Yew arrived in Beijing yesterday for a working visit and will meet several Chinese leaders, including President Jiang Zemin, the Xinhua news agency said.

Lee, accompanied by his wife and 16 senior Singaporean officials, would be in China until Sept. 11, Xinhua said. He arrived in Beijing from the eastern city of Qingdao.

He was scheduled to meet Jiang, Premier Li Peng and Li Ruihuan, head of a parliamentary body that serves as an advisory group to the government, the agency said.

Lee, who resigned as Singapore's prime minister in 1990 and is now senior minister, has unrivalled influence with both Beijing and Taipei, arch-rivals since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949.