CRI听力:UK Businessman: Deng "A Leader of Last Resort"

To many British businessmen, Deng was the person who opened the vast Chinese market to the outside world. Stephen Perry, chairman of UK's 48 Group Club, described him as "a leader of last resort".

CRI's UK correspondent Duan Xuelian has more.

Stephen Perry has one clear memory of his father playing bridge with the late Chinese leader in the early 1990s.

"Bridge is a very good game. People comment on the west that Deng Xiaoping only had one official position-Honorary Chairman of the Bridge Association."

Bridge requires a lot of contemplation, the same with economic planning. It was Deng Xiaoping's capacity to put words into action that impressed Perry most.

"I think he lived in the real world. I think he had a rare capability to contemplate the future, what should be achieved, what could be achieved, and plan a route to that destination."

Perry was one of the few foreign businessmen who ventured into the Chinese market in the early stages of the country's economic reform.

"When Deng Xiaoping made his speech in Shenzhen, we told people this is a very significant moment. I had put together the biggest foreign joint venture in China in the 1980s, and I said to British companies that you can do this kind of business in China, but people in Britain were quite conservative about the Chinese market."

Today, some thirty years later, China is one of the most attractive destinations for British investors. According to Perry, Deng Xiaoping was the economic prodigy behind this tremendous transformation.

"As I watch what he has created and as I watch how he let go of it and became a leader of last resort, he gave up micro-managing among other things, I saw his capacity to free others to do the work. He understood the big problems of succession, he knew it wouldn't be simple, but he knew the earlier people had the opportunity to take over the succession, better with the chance to success."

For CRI, I'm Duan Xuelian, reporting from London