A table-tennis match on Jan. 7 in Beijing marked the 30-year anniversary of the establishment of normalized diplomatic relations between China and the United States on Jan. 1, 1979. U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte, center left, and China's Vice Foreign Minister Wang Guangya, center right, attended.

In April 1971, China invited the U.S. table-tennis team to visit in what Time magazine called "the ping heard round the world." One of the Americans was then 15-year-old Judy Bochenski Hoarfrost, right, who returned today to play veteran Chinese player Qi Baoxiang, left. The 1971 visit launched an era of "Ping-Pong diplomacy," and according to Time, "Probably never before in history has a sport been used so effectively as a tool of international diplomacy." Obviously, with the 2008 Beijing Olympics, it hasn't been the only time China has used sports to try to improve its image.

See also:

• Chinese President Hu Jintao dominates at the Ping-Pong table.
• The FP photo essay, "China's 30 Years of Economic Overdrive," marks the reforms set in motion by Deng Xiaopeng.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy is hitting all the Middle East power centers in a two-day tour of the region. First, he held talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak at Sharm el-Sheikh. Then it's off to Ramallah to meet with PA President Mahmoud Abbas, before landing in Jerusalem in time for dinner with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. On day two, Sarkozy jets off to Lebanon and Syria.

The French president has tasked himself with the modest goal of negotiating an immediate ceasefire to the carnage in Gaza. Even if he fails to score a diplomatic victory, his whirlwind tour will no doubt represent a triumph of travel booking.

Sarkozy's extremely personal brand of diplomacy has taken him to over 40 countries in the first year and a half of his Presidency. His hyperactive travel schedule has spawned a long list of diplomatic initiatives: he went to Damascus to meet with President Bashar al-Assad, and attempted to enlist the Syrian president in joining his Union of the Mediterranean. He traveled to Moscow and Tblisi during the Russian invasion of Georgia, attempting to arrange a ceasefire.

He visited Abu Dhabi to sign a deal establishing a French naval base in the emirate, making it the only Western power other than the United States to have a permanent military installation in the Gulf. He paired with Gordon Brown to launch an initiative aimed at ending the genocide in Darfur, caused a diplomatic row with its traditional ally Morocco by first visiting its regional rival Algeria, and enraged many Africans by highlighting the positive aspects of European colonialism during a speech in Senegal.

All this travel has caused France's 2009 travel and entertainment budget for Sarkozy to balloon 29% over the previous year, to $55 million. The French taxpayers are getting precious few diplomatic victories for their money, but many headlines. And that seems to suit them just fine. Sarkozy's trips have raised France's international profile, much to the pleasure of many French voters. Whether the people of Gaza will reap any of the benefits of Sarkozy's diplomacy, however, remains to be seen.

Photo: AFP/Getty Images

Wow:

A hoax telephone call almost sparked another war between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan at the height of last month's terror attacks on Mumbai, officials and Western diplomats on both sides of the border said today.

Asif Ali Zardari, the Pakistani President, took a telephone call from a man pretending to be Pranab Mukherjee, India's Foreign Minister, on Friday, November 28, apparently without following the usual verification procedures, they said.

The hoax caller threatened to take military action against Pakistan in response to the then ongoing Mumbai attacks, which India has since blamed on the Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), they said.

Mr Zardari responded by placing Pakistan's air force on high alert and telephoning Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, to ask her to intervene.

But when Dr Rice called Mr Mukherjee, he said that he had not spoken to Mr Zardari and that his last conversation with Shah Mahmood Qureishi, the Pakistani Foreign Minister, had been quite civil.

"It's unbelievable, but true," said a Western diplomat familiar with the frantic diplomatic exchanges that eventually resolved the misunderstanding.

"It was a little alarming, to say the least."

UPDATE: Sherry Rehman, the Pakistani information minister, says the call was "processed, verified and cross-checked under an established procedure":

Without naming [leading Pakistani newspaper] Dawn, which carried the story in its edition of Dec 6 titled ‘A hoax call that could have triggered war’, a statement quoted the federal minister as having said, while commenting on reports in a section of the press, that it was not possible for any call to come through to the president without multiple caller identity verifications.

The Nov 28 call by someone from New Delhi who posed himself as Indian External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, she insisted, had also been processed, verified and cross-checked in accordance with an intricately laid down procedure.

“In fact the identity of this particular call, as evident from the caller line identification device, showed that the call was placed from a verified official phone number of the Indian ministry of external affairs”, Ms Rehman said.

It's amazing how quickly India appears to be falling into the terrorists' trap.

It seems obvious that Pakistan's civilian government, led by President Asif Ali Zardari, has no interest in stirring up trouble between the two nuclear-armed neighbors. And it seems equally obvious that any elements of the ISI, Pakistan's notorious intelligence service, who might have been in some way involved in the attacks in Mumbai would have done so in order to undermine rapprochement between Islamabad and New Delhi.

As for Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Kashmir-focused militant group has made clear that it aims to provoke conflict between India and Pakistan and stir up a pro-Islamist backlash among Muslims in India.

Yet one can already see public anger in India leading political developments in a direction the terrorists wanted. Some Indian politicians have been less than careful in saying the terrorists were sent by Pakistan, the state, rather than that they came from Pakistan, the country (which hasn't even been confirmed yet, anyway). India is considering halting talks over Kashmir and ending the five-year cease-fire along the Line of Control. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has vowed to "go after" those responsible for the attacks, which could box him into the dangerous step of taking action against Lashkar-e-Taiba within Pakistan-held territory.

Meanwhile, Pakistan's hackles are up, its military leaders raising the alert levels of their forces and threatening to divert troops from the Afghan border to the eastern border with India. Zardari's about-face on sending ISI chief Ahmad Shuja Pasha to New Delhi is clearly a response to domestic pressure after Indian newspapers said Pasha was being "summoned." Similarly, the more vocally India calls on Zardari and Army Chief of Staff Ashfaq Kayani to crack down on militancy, the tougher politically it will be for them to do so lest they be seen as doing New Delhi's bidding.

In India, the same sort of perverse dynamics are at work. Already, the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is making political hay out of the terror in Mumbai. The party has been running newspaper ads saying, "Fight Terror. Vote B.J.P." Instead of rallying behind Singh's government, the BJP has instead called for its resignation and accused Singh of being soft on terror. These tactics may well backfire, but based on the BJP's history of populist, anti-Muslim rhetoric, we should be concerned about its return to power.

Cranking up the pressure on Pakistan may fit the public mood in India -- and it may be smart politics for Singh and his ruling Congress Party -- but it is folly as policy.

Who benefits in Pakistan when tensions with India rise? Precisely the anti-democratic hardliners in the military and intelligence services, and the Islamic hardliners who are their sometime allies, that India should want to see marginalized. As one South Asia analyst told Reuters, "The forces that are threatening the West, the forces that are threatening the civilian democracy in Pakistan and the forces who are acting against India are all interlinked to each other."

We should pray that Singh has the wisdom and the political acumen to navigate this minefield more skillfully than he has thus far.

In a Politico piece on the formulation of Barack Obama's Russia strategy, Ben Smith brings up an episode from Campaign '08 that could make things awkward his presumptive secretary of state:

But he's also surrounded himself with people who consider themselves realists on the dangers posed by Russia's leadership, and he chose as his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who attacked Putin personally on the campaign trail, saying at one point that then-President Vladimir Putin "doesn't have a soul." (He shot back with the suggestion that she lacks a brain.)

I'm sure Clinton and Putin are more than capable of being civil when they inevitably meet. But given how often Clinton is described as a "realist," she certainly has a record of making bombastic statements about the foreign countries that Obama most wants to engage. For instance, if Obama is successful in initiating negotiations with Iran, Clinton will likely be speaking with representatives of a country that she onced mused the U.S. could "totally obliterate" any time it wanted.

Obama and Clinton have shown they're willing to put the bitter Democratic primary behind them. Will the rest of the world?

It makes sense that the British government would want to smooth over relations with Russia by sending a cabinet minister to visit Moscow, the first such visit in over a year. But couldn't the Brits have sent someone -- anyone -- other than Business Secretary Peter Mandelson, who is currently at the center of a scandal over his relationship with a Russian oligarch?

Mandelson's friendly overtures to the Kremlin have been entirely overshadowed by questions from the British press. At issue is whether favors from metals magnate Oleg Deripaska played a role in Mandelson's decision to reduce aluminum tariffs while he was EU trade commissioner, a decision that greatly benefited Russia's richest man. Months after the change, Deripaska entertained Mandelson and other VIPs on his yacht in the Mediterranean.

Mandelson angrily brushed aside a question about the scandal during a press conference Wednesday, telling the reporter, "You have wasted your question." Mandelson has been cleared by the British government of any wrongdoing, but during a BBC interview, also yesterday, he noticeably failed to deny that he and Deripaska had discussed lowering the tariffs prior to the decision being made.

The tabloids have been having a field day with the $9,000-a-night hotel suite where Lord Mandelson is staying during his Moscow visit, a questionable PR move during an economic crisis. The Daily Mail proclaimed the room, "Fit for an Oligarch." It also can't help Mandelson that Deripaska is back in the headlines for the $4.5 billion bailout he received from the Russian government this week.

The Brits might want a do-over on this one.

Photo: Alexey SAZONOV/AFP/Getty Images

PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images

Financial Times columnist Gideon Rachman's "well-placed sources" are telling him that Barack Obama might be thinking of an outside the box pick for ambassador to London... Oprah Winfrey.

Rachman acknowledges the idea sounds ridiculous, but there is a tradition of major campaign donors being rewarded with ambassadorships. I have to say, though, this would probably be a worse career move for Oprah than for Obama. If the world's most-powerful celebrity really wants to get involved in international diplomacy, there are probably more effective and enjoyable ways she can go about it on her own.

Rachman is one of the 10 foreign-policy experts FP enlisted to choose a "dream team" for the next U.S. president's cabinet. While all of the experts gave well-reasoned and thought-provoking choices, he seemed to have the most fun with the concept. Check out his pick for ambassador to Russia.

Think you can put together a better team than these out-of-touch political elites? Go for it. There's a write-in space, so feel free to nominate Oprah for any cabinet position you'd like.

At last Wednesday's United Nations Association 50th anniversary gala, rapper Jay-Z was honored for his work with the project Water for Life. Getting a bit too into the spirit, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon delivered a rap, which includes shout-outs to his homies Jay-Z, Ted Turner and Bill Luers, president of the United Nations Association of the United States of America. UN Dispatch's Mark Leon Goldberg passes along video and lyrics:

Global Classrooms are a cinch
With the help of Merrill Lynch
When you put the org in Google
Partnerships go truly gloooobal
There is hope for Earth's salvation
With the Cisneros Foundation
With Jay-Z there's double strife
Life for children and water for life
Human health will get ahead
With the valiant work of (RED)
For the poor and doing good
Stays the job of Robin Hood
UN stays on the front burner
Thanks to our champ Ted Turner
And whole revolutions stem
From the work of UNIFEM
But tonight my special shout-out
Goes to one I can't do without
We have traveled up and down
Frisco, Atlanta, Chicago town
Yes, the king of all the doers
Is my trusty friend Bill Luers
Bill, I cannot say goodbye
So take the floor and take a bow.
Ladies and Gentlemen, Ambassador Bill Luers"

Okay, so he's no Biggie. I'll take him over MC Rove any day, though.

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I was getting awfully tired of reading about Russia's strongly worded but vague "warnings" to its neighbors. Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski agrees, and expressed his displeasure yesterday in the politest way imaginable:

"Of course we don't like it when the Russian president or Russian generals threaten us with nuclear annihilation. It is not a friendly thing to do, and we have asked them to do it no more than once a month."

Who could say no to that?

Haaretz reports that Israel's ambassador to Egypt, Shalom Cohen, has had his term extended for three months because no one else wants to take his job:

[Foreign Minister Tzipi] Livni had hoped to replace Cohen with another prominent senior diplomat, or barring that, a well-known public figure or politician. She had also hoped the selection process would send a message to Egypt that its relationship with Israel was a priority for Jerusalem.

However, she soon discovered that eligible candidates were hardly jumping at the vacancy. She and Abramovitz offered the position to four of the ministry's deputy directors general, and all four turned it down.

The problem is that most of Israel's communication with Egypt is handled through the defense ministry or the prime minister's office, so the ambassador is little more than a symbolic representative in a country where, despite 30 years of peace, Israel still isn't all that popular with the general public. It's not that hard to understand why prominent Israeli diplomats aren't jumping at the opportunity.

It will be interesting to see if the foreign ministry will take a more prominent role if Livni succeeds in becoming prime minister.

FILE; SAMEH SHERIF/AFP/Getty Images

The one-year anniversary of the Annapolis Conference is fast approaching and the forecast for peace between Israel and Palestine is looking cloudy at best.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's quick retreat from the scene (he announced he would resign this month to deal with corruption charges) has stalled movement. And Palestinian President Authority Mahmoud Abbas told Ha'aretz that he is not happy with the lack of progress.

Further complicating matters, Abbas's presidential term is up on Jan. 9, leaving the two-state solution table without its key players. The Palestinian media reported that Abbas plans to dissolve the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), set up temporary government, and extend his term by a year.

But Hamas has already said that it will not accept his leadership after Jan. 9. Without elections, under Palestinian law Abbas would be succeeded by either the speaker or the deputy speaker of the PLC. Both men, conveniently enough, are members of Hamas.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice may be waxing optimistic that Annapolis's goals will be met in the coming months, but hearing that the IDF is already training units in the West Bank to prepare for the fallout in Abbas's absence, I'm thinking things are going to get worse before they get better. Memo to the next U.S. president: Don't wait until your seventh year in office to get things moving.

PHILIPPE WOJAZER/AFP/Getty Images

Anticipating round five in a series of peace talks with Israel, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad announced that his country submitted a six-point proposal to Turkish mediators during a summit in Damascus today, which brought together leaders of France and key Middle East peace brokers, Qatar and Turkey.

As Syria and Israel gear up for their first face-to-face meeting since 2000, conditions appear to be warming. When Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and President Assad joined President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris in July, their meeting was chilly -- no hand shake or even eye contact was exchanged.

Yet Sarko was clearly undeterred. His visit this week makes him the first Western leader to come to Syria since the country was blamed for the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq al-Hariri.

While Turkish facilitators are "very happy" with previous talks, potential obstacles loom. Olmert's July resignation leaves Israel without its chief negotiator and as a result this fifth round, initially set for this week, has been postponed to later in the month.

Assad, who already wants to wait for a new U.S. administration before elevating talks to the next level, made it clear today that real progress also banks on whether or not Israel's new prime minister will, as he put it, move in the same "direction Olmert had followed."

The general proposal Syria offered today concerns the "withdrawal line" and the degree to which Israel would withdraw from the Golan Heights. It's a touchy subject -- the same point collapsed negotiations in 2000.

While Olmert's office has yet to comment, some, like Israeli writer Ari Shavit, are calling for leaders to work fast while the iron is hot:

But if there is any step that could at present become a trend in the entire region, it is an Israeli-Syrian peace agreement. Such a treaty would bring about a positive strategic change: It would isolate Hezbollah, cause difficulties for Hamas, threaten Iran and provide support for the concerned moderate forces in the Sunni Arab world."

Indeed, Sarkozy, by inviting Syria into the fold (with Lebanon possibly to follow), explicitly seeks to move Damascus away from Tehran's influence.

It's a smart move. Let's hope the peace train, however, keeps moving.

FILE; TEH ENG KOON/AFP/Getty Images

Dmitry Medvedev may have hoped the Shanghai Cooperation Organization would evolve from a loose security bloc into an anti-NATO counterweight, but so far things don't look like they're going in the Russian president's favor. 

On Thursday, Medvedev asked the group, which also includes China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, to back Russia's response to Georgian "aggression." Instead, while the group welcomed "Russia's active role in contributing to peace and co-operation in the region," it condemned the use of force and reaffirmed its support for the sovereignty of the countries involved:

The SCO states express grave concern in connection with the recent tensions around the South Ossetian issue and urge the sides to solve existing problems peacefully, through dialogue, and to make efforts facilitating reconciliation and talks," their statement said.

That China and the others spoke of respecting territorial integrity should come as no surprise. From its relations with Sudan abroad to its concerns with seperatists in Tibet and Xinjiang at home, China has long expressed a policy of non-intervention.

Russia, too, was often a strong opponent of Western interventions -- in Iraq and Kosovo, among others -- which makes its military action in Georgia all the more galling. Its Asian allies, though, haven't jumped on board. That, at the very least, should be a comforting sign for the West amid cries of a new Cold War.

For more on how Russia's recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia may backfire, check out FP's interview with regional expert and CIA veteran Paul Goble.

Guang Niu/Getty Images

Last month, I blogged about the roundball diplomacy during the NBA's summer league in Utah, where Iran's national team was invited to participate as part of its preparations for the Olympics. The gesture was, by most accounts, a success, even though the squad subsequently went winless in Beijing.

Along the way, Iranian center Hamed Ehadadi piqued the interest of NBA scouts. The 7-2 Ehadadi averaged 16 points and 10 rebounds during the Olympics, capping the games with a 21-point, 16-rebound performance against a strong Argentina team, which faces the United States in the semifinals tomorrow.

Of course, as with all things Iran, there was a catch: The NBA informed its teams last week that it had "been advised that a federal statue prohibits a person or organization in the United States from engaging in business dealings with Iranian nationals." Ehadadi's NBA dreams had been dashed -- and it seemed like another missed opportunity for more roundball diplomacy.

Not so fast, however. The U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control has now offered its stamp of approval, and NBA teams are free to sign Ehadadi, pending final approval from the league and OFAC. Ehadadi expects to sign with the Memphis Grizzlies:

I will undoubtedly join Memphis Grizzlies by the end of next week. I met Memphis' officials yesterday to discuss joining the team… I received many offers from European teams but just playing in the NBA is my dream. Hopefully, I can join Memphis as soon as possible without any problem.

Ehadadi may not turn out to be a star in the NBA, but chalk up another victory for roundball diplomacy. David Stern is far from a perfect commissioner, but his emphasis on making basketball a global game appears to be paying off. Even if, in some cases, it works too well.