China has been extremely active on the world stage in recent years. We are seeing the China-Africa Summit this week, a great illustration of Beijing's "Charm Offensive" that has sent Chinese diplomats everywhere from Latin America to Africa.

Charlene Barshefsky, a former US Trade Representative under President Clinton, has gone one step further in calling for China to take a more active role in WTO: "China should be a manager of the WTO instead of merely a part of it."

For the conspiracy-minded folks of the world, the thought of China "managing" the WTO is scary, but Barshefsky was not trying to further this sort of theory. She is merely saying that China's status has grown immensely in the past six years, and because of this, it is in a good position to help move the process of international trade liberalization forward. The process could certainly use some help these days.