Soon after Juan Antonio Samaranch's death on April 21, 2010, his daughter, Maria Teresa, handed some of his possessions to her father's old friend, Eugenio Bregolat who was the ambassador of Spain to China on three occasions (February 1987 to August 1991, April 1999 to October 2003, and January 2011 to February 2013). Among them were papers documenting an opinion poll that had been carried out in China in 2009.

China Radio International, Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, and the State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs jointly conducted the poll to discover the "10 international friends" who were deemed to have helped China the most during the past 100 years.

Highly regarded

"And Samaranch ranked third," Bregolat told the Global Times. "And as the first and second - the Canadian Norman Bethune and the German John Rabe - were already long dead, it showed that Samaranch was then the most highly regarded living foreigner among Chinese people."

Bregolat told the Global Times that he first became acquainted with Samaranch in 1977 when the latter was Spanish ambassador to Moscow. "I was his assistant at that time," he said. And this was a friendship that was to last more than 30 years until Samaranch's death.

Last weekend, Bregolat visited Shanghai to give a speech about his late friend at the Miguel de Cervantes Library on Anfu Road. He was accompanied by Samaranch's son, Juan Antonio, who is now the president of the Samaranch Foundation in Beijing.

This non-profit foundation, co-launched by both the descendants of Samaranch, the Chinese government and also the Spanish government in 2012, is mainly devoted to promoting sporting events between China and Spain.

Bregolat believes that an important reason Samaranch was able to build such successful, long-term relationships with the Middle Kingdom is because he held a typically Chinese way of looking at life. His philosophy was similar to that of the "golden mean" (zhongyong) of the Confucianism, which emphasizes the importance of balance and of trying to achieve a state of harmony.

"I believe this is one of the most important qualities that any diplomat must have," Bregolat added.

Perhaps, the most obvious example of Samaranch's skills was in the way he dealt with the problems between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan concerning representation in the International Olympic Committee (IOC). Before 1979, the Chinese mainland had not had a seat in the IOC since 1958, whereas Taiwan did have one.

In 1979, soon after Samaranch became a member of the IOC, he began to make efforts to give the Chinese mainland a greater say in the organization, and to create the conditions that would allow the Chinese mainland to actively re-enter the Olympic Games.

Among Samaranch's achievements was reaching a decision with Beijing whereby Taiwan could compete in the Olympic Games under the name "Chinese Taipei."

In Samaranch's opinion, the relationship between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan is like that of a watermelon and its seeds. It is impossible for one seed to exist without the whole.

And besides the principle of the "golden mean," Samaranch Jr. and Bregolat both believe the Barcelona-born diplomat was possessed of two important qualities: being farsighted in his decision-making; and having the ability to build solid relationships. These two qualities, they believe, were characteristic of his whole life.

Broadcasting rights

Bregolat told the Global Times that the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow, (where Samaranch had previously been an ambassador) and the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, both shaped his view of the Olympic ideal.  

And during his tenure as IOC president, he worked tirelessly to promote the games as a more professional and commercial event, including rewriting the rules of broadcasting rights to screen the Olympic Games. 

"My father was primarily a seeker," Samaranch Jr. told the Global Times. "And he was an athlete who created the first rollerball team in Spain and he liked football very much when he was young. He was also a banker, businessman and a politician."

But Samaranch was not without his critics, especially over the way he handled the issue of drug misuse among athletes, and of allegations of corruption within the IOC itself. 

Today, Samaranch Jr. is a member of the IOC, and he told the Global Times that he believes his father's relationship with China resembled that of "a couple of lovers," a love that he himself is endeavoring to sustain.