"We both need a positive, cooperative and constructive relationship," Clark T. Randt, a lawyer and former diplomat with 20 years of experience in Asia, said in a speech in Mandarin. "To this end, I pledge my best efforts to bring us closer."

"The United States and China are two great nations with two great peoples," Randt said outside his new official residence. "We share many similarities, among which is the common human desire of our peoples for peace, prosperity and better lives for their children."

Randt replaces Joseph Prueher, a retired Navy admiral named to the post by former President Clinton in 1999.

A former commercial attache at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing in the early 1980s, the 55-year-old Randt was a fraternity buddy of President Bush at Yale. Before his appointment as ambassador, he was chief China lawyer at the law firm Shearman and Sterling.

Randt has helped Chinese companies sell shares to American investors and represented AT&T, Apple, Chrysler and Johnson & Johnson as they sought investments in China.

"No one could have imagined the remarkable developments that I have personally witnessed during my many visits," Randt said.

He graduated from Yale and earned his law degree from the University of Michigan in 1975.

(People's Daily 07/24/2001)