On his first visit to China as Singapore’s prime minister, Lee Kuan Yew — whose great-grandfather came from Guangdong province — said of his family’s impression of his hosts: “We found them and their manners alien”.
But the UK-educated Lee, who has died aged 91, developed one of the keenest understandings of China and its leadership on repeated visits after that first trip in 1976, when he managed a brief handshake with the ailing Chairman Mao.
Indeed, perhaps no other world leader could claim a better understanding of China’s secretive leaders and its political system over the past few decades than Lee, who always managed to stay onside with both Beijing and Washington.
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