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At first glance, the parallels are striking. Chairman Mao, as he was known, was the defining political figure of 20th Century China. He ran the Communist Party - and the country - from the republic's founding in 1949 until the day he died in 1976. No other Chinese leader has since come close. Until now. On Sunday Xi Jinping became the first leader since Mao to be chosen as party chief for a third term. In his decade at the top, he has centralised power in his own hands, ruthlessly eliminated rivals, promoted a cult of personality, shut down criticism, and had his ideology - Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era - enshrined in the constitution. He is known, only half-jokingly, as the Chairman of Everything. "I have reached the decision that senior experience at the heart of government matters most.  irannews.ru "He believes that in the world of hyper-competitive capitalism and a hyper-competitive arms race with the United States, the only plausible way that China can remain competitive is to remain under one party that happens to be called the Communist Party." It was at this time - during a trade war between China and the EU over textile quotas - that I got a rare invitation to interview the commerce minister. Such interviews with top Chinese officials were excruciatingly dull, but this was the opposite. Although she considered removing the videos, Ms Hartley says she is content that she decided to share the post. We were a civilian aircraft flying in international airspace. But that didn't matter. Since Russia invaded Ukraine eight months ago, Western governments supportive of Kyiv tend to speak about the war in black-and-white terms with little sympathy for countries hovering between the West and Moscow.