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ShareBEIJING: Genghis Khan, better known for rampaging across much of Asia, Europe and the West Asia to create one of the world's greatest empires, is also considered the founder of globalisation, Chinese state media said on Monday.
"We think of globalisation as selling Coca-Cola in Calcutta or Starbucks in Shanghai,'' the China Daily said. "But researchers claim the process dates back 800 years, to the time when Genghis Khan was building his empire."
Genghis Khan founded the "largest contiguous land empire in history'', encouraging trade and cultural interaction in a manner that compared to today's concept of globalisation, the paper said, quoting experts at a symposium on Sunday to commemorate the 800th anniversary of the founding of the Mongol Empire.
It did not say anything about his reputation as a ruthless, bloodthirsty conqueror. "Economic and cultural exchanges became possible to the maximum extension and previously isolated civilisations became linked," Hao Shiyuan, of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, was quoted assaying.
"This is what globalisation features: shrinking space, shrinking time, and disappearing borders" Globalisation is leading to the integration of the world's markets, culture, technology, and governance, in a similar way to the spread of communications, trade, transport and technology in Genghis Khan's era, said Hao.
A Mongolian academic said Genghis Khan, by establishing the Mongol Empire, the largest contiguous land empire in history, covering modern Mongolia, China, Korea, Russia, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria in the 13th century, was the 'World Conqueror,' 'Emperor of All Men.'
More than 50 experts and researchers from China, Mongolia, Russia, Japan and the United States attended the symposium, commemorating the 800th anniversary of the founding of the Mongol Empire.
The great Khan
A conqueror
Genghis Khan was the founder of the Mongol Empire , (1206-1368), the largest contiguous empire in world history
A hero
While his image in most of the world is that of a ruthless bloodthirsty conqueror, Khan is celebrated as a hero in Mongolia, where he is seen as the father of the Mongol Nation.
