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| Mr. Wei Jianguo is in charge of the Department of Western Asian and African Affairs, Department of Electromechanical Products & Science and Technology Industry, Department of Aid to Foreign Countries, the Executive Bureau of International Economic Cooperation and China Chamber of Commerce for Import & Export of Machinery & Electronic Products. |
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| 2004 International Seminar on the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge Regional Cooperation Inaugurated |
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On August 26, 2004 International Seminar on the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge Regional Cooperation was inaugurated in Urumqi. The main theme of the 2-day Seminar was "Cooperation and Development in the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge Area". In-depth discussions were held during the Seminar on such topics as promoting the regional economic cooperation and trade between China and central Asian and European countries alongside the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge, building a New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge in the air, and co-sharing and developing of the tourist resources in the region.
Wu Yi, Vice Premier of the State Council, sent a congratulatory letter to the Seminar, in which she expressed her hope that attendees could take good advantage of the Seminar to set a common goal of making this international transportation channel smooth to promote the social and economic development of the region alongside the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge. Moreover she hoped that the results of the Seminar could enrich the content of the high-level governmental cooperation mechanisms and dialogues such as the Asia-Europe Meeting and Shanghai Cooperation Organization so as to make the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge a new silk road with an integrated system of port, aviation and railway.
Vice Minister of Commerce, Mr. Wei Jianguo delivered a speech at the opening ceremony. He said that after the successful convening of the 2003 International Seminar on New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge Regional Cooperation in Zhengzhou, the Chinese government earnestly organized researches on policies of pushing forward the social and economic development in areas alongside the continental bridge in China, especially policies concerning logistics development. Relevant ministries, local governmental departments and the business community effective exchanged ideas and cooperated with each other to materialize their respective tasks assigned at the Working Conference of the coordinating group. At the beginning of this year, the central government of China clearly defined the building of the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge and promoting the social and economic development of Xijiang as a priority in China’s Developing the West strategy. All these initiatives created favorable conditions for implementing the suggestions put forward in the Zhengzhou Declaration.
Mr. Wei Jianguo said that in recent years, the economic and technological cooperation between China and Central Asia had been developing rapidly. In 2003, the trade volume between China and the 5 countries in Central Asia amounted to US$4.07 billion, up by 70.4% as compared with 2002. At present, China's investment in Central Asia exceeded US$1 billion. In addition to the bilateral cooperation, China's regional economic cooperation under the framework of Shanghai Cooperation Organization with 4 Central Asian countries, namely Kazakhstan, Kirgizia, Tajikistan, and Ukraine, had been started and progressing steadily in line with the "Three-Step" general proposal of China: 1, Promoting trade and investment facilitation. 2, Making every effort to implement the economic and technical cooperation projects in order to promote common development. And 3 studying on and enforcing step by step the free trade area as a long term target of the regional the economic cooperation. Currently five working groups (Customs, Quality Supervision, E-commerce, Investment promotion and Developing the cross-border potential) had been set up.
Meanwhile, he pointed out that the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge could be expanded to Japan and Republic of Korea. China-Japan economic and trade relations played an important role in the external trade and economic relations of China. Since the establishment of the diplomatic ties between China and the Republic of Korea, bilateral trade and economic cooperation developed with unprecedented high speed in the world. Therefore, there were big demands for the development of the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge, which was of great significance to the trade and investment facilitation in Asia and Europe.
Whiling referring to the theme of the Seminar, Mr. Wei Jiangguo said that he hoped all parties could continue to attach importance to the development of the New Asia-Europe Continental Bridge, an international transportation channel, and actively participate in the exploitation of tourist resources and construction of air transport routes to create broader prospective and more opportunities for the social and economic development in countries alongside the Bridge.
(Information by Network Center of MOFCOM)
(News source: English Website of Ministry of Commerce)
(All information published in this website is authentic in Chinese. English is provided for reference only. )
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