By NNN-SANA,
Manama : The 3rd session of the Ministerial meeting of the Arab-Chinese Cooperation Forum began in Manama Tuesday with the participation of Syria.
Chinese Assistant Foreign Minister Zhai Jun stressed that the formation of this Forum is considered as an important strategic step on the road of unifying the two sides’ efforts to face the standing challenges and consolidate the traditional friendship and cooperation between the Arab world and China.
He expressed his country’s readiness to expand cooperation to enable the two parties to face the global challenges according to a common vision based on equivalent consultation and constructive dialogue.
He presented a group of proposals to develop the Arab-Chinese relations on the political, economic and cultural levels through coordinating their stances, asserting China’s support to the restoration of the Arab legitimate rights.
He hailed the Arab countries’ support to China in various issues, particularly regarding Taiwan, Tibet and Human Rights issues.
He called for activating the economic and trade exchange through achieving integrity in the technological, resources and markets fields and expanding cooperation in the trade and financial domains in addition to developing human resources, tourism, health and customs cooperation.
He underlined the importance of boosting cooperation in the energy, and investment and establishment of a free trade zone to promote the level of economic and trade cooperation between the two sides.
For his part, Assistant Secretary General for Political Affairs at the Arab League Ahmad Bin Hili underlined the importance of cooperation between the Arab countries and China, particularly in the education, sciences, technology, health, tourism, sport, agriculture, rural development and fighting poverty.
He expressed hope to continue political consultation on issues of mutual concern due to the extraordinary circumstances the region is passing through which necessitates an extraordinary support of China through finding just solution to the Middle East issue and supporting the other Arab causes.