"Zhou was born in Jiangsu Province in August 1945.
Married and with one daughter, he joined the Beijing Diplomats Service
Bureau in 1970, where he worked until 1973, when he went to the UK
for advanced studies at the University of Bath and London School of
Economics.
Upon his return to China in 1975, Zhou was employed in the Foreign
Ministry's Translation Office. Three years later, he was transferred
to the Chinese Embassy in the US, where he worked until 1983.
After a stint as head of the Translation Office, he returned to
the US in 1987 as vice consul general in San Francisco.
In 1990, Zhou was named ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary
to Barbados and concurrently to Antigua & Barbuda, positions
he held until 1993 when he came back to China to serve as vice director
of the Foreign Ministry's Department of North American and Oceanian
Affairs.
Zhou returned to California in 1994 to take over as consul general
in Los Angeles, and from 1995 to 1998 served as China's envoy to
the US.
He was appointed ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary to
Australia in 1998.
Zhou has served as assistant to the foreign minister and then as
vice foreign minister since 2001."