Xi launches Belt and Road forum to map out new global vision
BEIJING - World leaders gathered in Beijing Sunday for the opening of the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation, to embrace a Chinese solution to stimulate global growth and promote prosperity for all. Addressing the opening of the most prestigious international gathering China has ever launched, President Xi Jinping said the Belt and Road Initiative is “a project of the century” that will benefit people across the world. A total of 29 foreign heads of state and government leaders attended the forum, including Russian President Vladimir Putin. Other delegates include officials, entrepreneurs, financiers and journalists from over 130 countries, and representatives of key international organizations, such as UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, and Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund Christine Lagarde.
The two-day forum, which also features a round-table summit of global leaders on Monday, is one of the highest-level assemblies in today’s world. At its center is Xi’s grand plan to better combine the rapidly expanding Chinese economy with the development of Asia, Europe, Africa and beyond. Named after the historic Silk Road, the Belt and Road Initiative was proposed by Xi in 2013 to chart out new territories for international cooperation. “Spanning thousands of miles and years, the ancient silk routes embody the spirit of peace and cooperation, openness and inclusiveness, mutual learning and mutual benefit,” Xi told an audience of more than 1,500. “The Silk Road spirit has become a great heritage of human civilization,” he said.
By linking countries and regions that account for about 60 percent of the world’s population and 30 percent of global GDP, the initiative is a perfect example of China sharing its own wisdom and solutions for global growth and governance. “The pursuit of this initiative is based on extensive consultation and its benefits will be shared by us all,” Xi said. All countries, from either Asia, Europe, Africa or the Americas, can be international cooperation partners of the Belt and Road Initiative, he said. Xi noted that the humankind has reached an age of great progress, great transformation and profound changes, while the world is fraught with challenges.
With the Belt and Road Initiative, China wants to turn the legends of the ancient Silk Road into a modern story of inclusive growth and crosscontinental cooperation. “The Belt and Road Initiative is rooted in a shared vision for global development,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said at the forum’s opening. “Running through Asia, Europe and Africa and extended to the whole world, it is far-reaching in geography and in ambition,” he said. Over the next two days, world leaders will immerse themselves in the early fruits of the initiative: over 40 countries and international organizations have signed agreements with China on Belt and Road cooperation; total trade between China and other Belt and Road countries has exceeded 3 trillion U.S. dollars between 2014 and 2016; and Chinese investment in these countries has surpassed 50 billion dollars. Chinese companies have set up 56 economic cooperation zones in over 20 countries, generating some 1.1 billion dollars of tax revenue and 180,000 local jobs. (Xinhua)