Visiting Chinese President Jiang Zemin said Wednesday in Berlin that German business and banking institutions are welcome to further cooperate with China to boost economic and trade relations between the two countries.
Jiang, speaking at a banquet hosted by the Asia-Pacific Committee of German Business, said the two countries have enjoyed a political relationship of mutual trust and a good economic and trade relationship, adding that broad potential exists for them to expand cooperation in various fields.
He said that China welcomes businesses of all countries to enter into various forms of economic and technological cooperation with China so as to achieve a win-win result.
Jiang noted that Germany has advantages to cooperate with China in the fields of agriculture, transportation, telecommunication and energy industry.
He expressed the hope that German business and financial circles will take a more active attitude toward cooperating with China with their advanced technologies.
With a trade volume of 23.5 billion U.S. dollars, Jiang said, the two countries have scored remarkable progress in bilateral economic and trade ties, with Germany being China's largest trade and technological partner in Europe and China being one of the most important economic and trade partners in Asia.
In recent years, he said, the two sides have reached agreement on a series of major cooperation projects and Germany is expected to become Europe's largest investor in China. He added that such cooperation has brought about practical benefits to both sides.
So long as both sides are forward-looking and stick to the principle of mutual benefit, their economic and technological cooperation will surely improve further, Jiang said.
Jiang arrived here Monday afternoon for his second state visit to Germany, since his first in July 1995. Germany is the first leg of Jiang's two-week five-nation trip, which will also take him to Libya, Nigeria, Tunisia and Iran. He is scheduled to leave for Libya on April 13.
(Xinhua News Agency April 11, 2002)
