China, France agree to promote cooperation to set example of major-country relationship
PARIS - China and France should upgrade bilateral cooperation to set an example of positive interactions, mutual benefit, winwin outcomes and friendly relations among major countries, visiting Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said here Saturday.
Tackling the COVID-19 pandemic and its severe impact on the world calls for solidarity, Wang said during talks with French Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs JeanYves Le Drian. He recalled that since the virus outbreak, Chinese President Xi Jinping and his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, have had four phone conversations while foreign ministers of the two countries have talked to each other seven times, and the Chinese and French people have been supporting and helping each other.
“This proves that solidarity and cooperation are the most powerful weapons to defeat the pandemic,” he said. Wang also noted that his visit to France during his first overseas tour under the situation of regular COVID-19 prevention and control fully reflects the importance China attaches to France as an independent major country and to the European Union (EU) as an important pole in the world.
China is willing to work with France to seek stronger bilateral ties, further promote ChinaEU cooperation and safeguard multilateralism more effectively, said Wang. “The ChinaFrance relations, as one of the most stable and sound relations among major countries in today’s world that undergoes changes rarely seen in a century, bear even more prominent global significance,” he said. Both sides should, under the guidance of the head-ofstate diplomacy, give full play to the role of the China-France relations in promoting the relationship between China and Western countries, in order to set an example of positive interactions among major countries, he said.
“We should promote quality improvement and upgrading of the bilateral cooperation driven by large-scale project cooperation to set an example of mutual benefit and winwin outcomes among major countries,” he added. Both sides should take cooperation in innovation as a breakthrough, promote cooperation in fields such as smart cities, electric vehicles, organic agriculture and food, financial science and technology and digital economy, and jointly provide fair, just, open and non-discriminatory business environment for enterprises of both sides, so as to set an example for major countries to seek a shared future, said Wang.
(Xinhua)