Hundreds of thousands lined the streets of Vietnam's capital on Octo-berrjth as Li Keqiang, China's prime minister, arrived for a three-day visit. They were not there for him, though. It was a state funeral for Vo Nguyen Giap, a legendary general, second only to Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam's pantheon of national heroes. Indeed, many Vietnamese found the timing of Mr Li's arrival rather offensive and thought that he should have postponed it to avoid intruding on their grief.'Disrespectful' and 'arrogant' were two adjectives used.'Typical' was another. Unperturbed, Mr Li (pictured above, left) was able to portray his meeting with his Vietnamese counterpart, Nguyen Tan Dung (above, right), as a 'breakthrough'. It capped a fortnight of high-level Chinese diplomacy in South-East Asia, intended to repair ties frayed in recent years by China's extensive and disputed territorial claims in the South China Sea.
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