CIRSD President Vuk Jeremić attended the prestigious China Development Forum (CDF), held annually at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, as a special guest of the organizers alongside former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and Robert Rubin, Chairman of the Council on Foreign Relations and former U.S. Treasury Secretary.
The three-day annual gathering is the flagship annual conference of the Development Research Center of the China State Council whose President (Minister) is Li Wei, a member of the CIRSD Board of Advisors.
For close to two decades, the CDF has served as an important venue for senior members of the Chinese leadership to present fresh policy economic decisions to leading members of the global business and financial community.
This year, high-level international participants at the CDF included IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde and Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, as well as more than 100 international corporate heads including those from BP, Blackstone, Bloomberg, Caterpillar, Deutsche Bank, Ericsson, Microsoft, Nestlé, Pfizer, Rio Tinto, Shell, Siemens, and TOTAL, amongst many others. Also attending were nearly 250 senior Chinese officials and business leaders.
CIRSD President Vuk Jeremić chaired a keynote panel entitled “Enhancing Connectivity and Building the ‘One Belt, One Road’.” The panel featured a speech by Jin Liqun, the Secretary-General of the multilateral body tasked with establishing the new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), in which he outlined the AIIB’s ambitious plans to enhance connectivity throughout Asia. The panel also featured remarks by, amongst others, President and CEO of Saudi Aramco Khalid Al-Falih, Global Managing Director of McKinsey & Co. Dominic Barton, and President and CEO of MasterCard Ajay Banga.
“It’s a tremendous honor to participate in one of the most influential global platforms for international debate on critical issues concerning China’s and the world’s development and cooperation strategies,” Jeremić said. “In our panel, we discussed the strategic framework of the new Silk Road initiative, which, if realized, would represent the greatest infrastructural endeavor in human history; it has the potential to fundamentally transform the politics and economics of globalization in the 21st century,” Jeremić said.
On the margins of the CDF, Jeremić also met with China’s Premier Li Keqiang and Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
Accompanying CIRSD President Vuk Jeremić to the CDF were CIRSD Executive Director Zdravko Ponoš and CIRSD Senior Fellow Damjan Krnjević Mišković.
Maria Fernanda Espinosa Calls for Stronger Preventive Diplomacy as the UN Marks its 80th Anniversary
As the United Nations commemorates its 80th anniversary, Maria Fernanda Espinosa, former President of the UN General Assembly and Co-Chair of the Global Preventive Diplomacy Initiative (GPDI), spoke to CGTN’s flagship program The Agenda about the urgent need to modernize the UN and make preventive diplomacy the central pillar of its peace and security agenda.
Read more
CIRSD and NGIC Coorganize a High-Level Conference at the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna
Vienna, October 21, 2025 — The Center for International Relations and Sustainable Development (CIRSD) and the Nizami Ganjavi International Center (NGIC), convened a high-level international conference titled “Shifting Grounds: The Caucasus, Central Asia and Europe in a New Global Order”, in partnership with the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna.
Read more
Vuk Jeremić Addresses the China Institute’s Thinkers Forum on the Future of the World Order
Shanghai, October 2025 — President of the Center for International Relations and Sustainable Development (CIRSD) Vuk Jeremić, took part in the Thinkers Forum organized by the China Institute, marking the jubilee 10th anniversary of this distinguished institution.
Read more
Kazakhstan Will be an Enduring Geopolitical Convergence Point
As the history of humanity repeatedly demonstrates, being blessed with geography alone is no guarantee of long-term survival, let alone tangible influence. Instead, one’s ability to use geography as leverage for far-reaching strategy is what separates the survivors from those that stay on the margins.
Read more