China’s President Xi Jinping is now one of the most powerful men in the world, but it hasn’t always been this way. Xi has stared down revolutionary fervor during the Cultural Revolution – and muscled out rivals in an atmosphere of brutal party politics to now become the paramount leader of China’s Communist Party. We look at how Xi Jinping went from life among Beijing’s political elite – to living in a cave in remote countryside – to now being China’s most powerful ruler since Mao. Under the strong leadership of Xi Jinping, modern China is experiencing an economic boom, and its bold innovations are changing the way people used to think about the sleeping giant. China is looking to become a world power by pressing its dominance in world affairs and expanding global trade with massive international investment in hundreds of countries, including many in Africa. China's growing global news network CGTN tells stories from a "Chinese perspective" – but what that looks like in practice is more like serving the ideological aims of the Chinese Communist Party. Beijing is training up foreign journalists, buying up space in overseas media and expanding its own networks on an unprecedented scale in an attempt to challenge what it perceives as Western hegemony over global media. China is also aggressively expanding its military and global reach in territories such as the South China Sea.