Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's visit to South Korea and Japan is a great
success in strengthening mutually beneficial cooperation and
promoting the economic and trade ties, Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing said Friday.
Wen paid an official visit to South Korea and Japan from April
10 to 13. This is the first time a Chinese premier has visited the
two countries in seven years.
Economic and trade cooperation is an important component of
developing an all-round partnership of cooperation with South Korea
and a mutually beneficial strategic relationship with Japan, for
both nations are China's important trading and investment partners,
Li told Chinese reporters.
During his talks with leaders and entrepreneurs of both
countries, Wen put forward proposals to further develop the
bilateral economic and trade cooperation, underlining the focus on
areas like energy saving, environmental protection,
telecommunication and high-tech.
Wen also elaborated on China's policies concerning the
enterprise income tax, intellectual property rights protection and
investment environment.
Wen's proposals have drawn positive responses from both
countries, Li said, adding that Wen's introductions on China's
policies, which were regarded by both countries' entrepreneurs as
fair and reasonable, helped enhance mutual understanding.
During his two-day visit to South Korea, Wen called for an
active implementation of a development layout of medium- and
long-term economic and trade cooperation, and an early signing of
an investment protection agreement between the two countries,
according to Li.
Wen also said the two sides should push forward the joint study
of building a free trade zone, properly handle each other's concern
on economic and trade issues, and achieve the goal of increasing
the bilateral trade volume to US$200 billion at an early date.
South Korean leaders and entrepreneurs expressed their
willingness to enhance cooperation in such fields as environmental
protection, energy saving and telecommunication with China, Li
said.
South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun said he hoped the two
countries could achieve common development and maintain common
interests through high-level cooperation and fair competition, Li
added.
During his three-day visit to Japan, the Chinese premier and his
Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe jointly launched a high-level
economic dialogue mechanism.
The mechanism, which is of historic significance, signals the
upgrade of bilateral economic cooperation and will play an active
role in expanding economic cooperation between the two countries,
Li said.
The foreign minister also said the two nations pledged to take
advantage of the mechanism to increase policy communications on
major regional and international economic issues, and boost
cooperation in a wider range of areas.
The Chinese premier arrived in Seoul on Tuesday morning for the
first visit to South Korea in his capacity as premier. He held
talks with his South Korean counterpart Han Duck-soo, and South
Korean President Roh Moo-hyun, and attended the opening ceremony
for the China-South Korea Exchange Year.
Premier Wen flew to Tokyo Wednesday for an "ice-thawing" journey
to Japan. He met with Japanese Emperor Akihito and held talks with
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Wen delivered a speech on
Sino-Japanese friendship and cooperation to the Japanese
parliament.
(Xinhua News Agency April 14, 2007)
