President Xi Jinping has long been an advocate of the development of the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region. As early as December 2002, shortly after he became Party secretary of Zhejiang province, Xi wrote a letter to areas in Xinjiang that were receiving support from the province. In the letter, he expressed care for the impoverished areas and affirmed the commitment to effectively carry out the paired assistance program. In August 2003, he led a delegation on an eight-day visit to Xinjiang, during which he engaged in discussions and exchanges with local officials to foster economic cooperation between Zhejiang and Xinjiang. In Hotan, Xi took part in a ceremony to lay the foundation for the prefecture's first science, culture and sports center. Four years later, after he became Party secretary of Shanghai, Xi sent another letter to those areas in Xinjiang, pledging continued care and support. In 2009, as Chinese vice-president, he made a five-day fact-finding trip to Xinjiang and reaffirmed the country's commitment to promoting Xinjiang's reform, development and stability. During his 2014 inspection tour of Xinjiang, his first visit to the region as China's top leader, Xi emphasized the essential role of the paired assistance program, saying that greater efforts should be made to strengthen paired assistance and improve the work mechanism to jointly promote social stability and long-term security in Xinjiang. At a high-level symposium on work related to Xinjiang in Beijing in May that year, soon after the visit, Xi said that paired assistance to Xinjiang is a national strategy that must be upheld over the long term. #XiJinping #XiVision #70YearsofXinjiang