Jean-Pierre Raffarin, French politician, born August 1948

Jean-Pierre Raffarin is a French politician who served as prime minister of France from May 6, 2002 to May 31, 2005.
Active on the international stage, he has made several visits to China. He is also chairman of the annual French-Chinese seminar of the Comité France Chine and of the Fondation pour la Prospective et l’Innovation. In early 2018 he was appointed by President Emmanuel Macron as special representative of the French Government for China.

Isabel Crook, Canadian educator, born August 1915

As one of the first foreign teachers at a Chinese university and a witness to China's transformation from war to peace, Canadian Isabel Crook is a communist and a pioneer of English teaching in New China. Eager to be part of the revolution after completing their study of the land reform, Isabel Crook and his husband David Crook accepted an invitation from Communist Party of China leaders to teach at a newly established foreign affairs school in 1948. The school was the forerunner of today's Beijing Foreign Studies University, which has seen more than 400 ambassadors and 1,000 counselors walk through its doors.