23-year-old Zhang Zilin, who holds the title Miss China, has won
the Miss World pageant, with Miss Angola and Miss Mexico the top
runners-up.
The 57th Miss World contest was held at Sanya, a tourist resort in
southern China's Hainan province, with the final round of judging
Saturday. The program included messages aimed at increasing public
awareness of the dangers of AIDS and HIV, in honor of World AIDS
Day.
Zhang, a secretary, was the pre-pageant favorite to win the title.
As the tallest woman in the competition at 182 centimeters, she
made a wry reference to her height and China's huge population
during the interview phase of the pageant, saying she felt strong
support because "there are 1.3 billion people behind me."
As part of the pageant's AIDS prevention theme, Nelson Mandela's
grandson Mandla Mandela introduced a video of the former South
African president's message for World AIDS Day. The Nobel
laureate's daughter, Maki, was one of the competition's nine
judges.
Nelson Mandela's son Makgatho died of AIDS-related illness in
2005.
Organizers say the Miss World competition was broadcast worldwide
to an enormous potential audience.
This definitely feels hokey to me but a very good PR stunt by
China
