DHAKA: China’s leaders bowed three times before a statue of Mao Zedong on the 120th anniversary of his birth on Thursday in carefully controlled celebrations that also sought to uphold the market-style reforms that came after his death.

The approach underscores the delicate balancing act the Communist Party leadership, installed last year, has to perform in managing perceptions of Mao’s legacy.

As heirs of the authoritarian one-party political system imposed by Mao and his party comrades, the current leadership has a strong interest in venerating his memory in a bid to bolster their legitimacy.

But they have also pledged to undertake market reforms needed to rejuvenate a slowing economy, measures that would have been anathema to Mao.

President and Communist Party chief Xi Jinping and other top leaders paid tribute to the founder of the communist state with a visit to his mausoleum on Tiananmen Square in the heart of the capital, Beijing, the official Xinhua News Agency said, reports The Straits Times.

BDST: 1424 HRS, DEC 26, 2013
Edited by Robab Rosan, Current Affairs Editor