Chinese top political advisor holds talks with NZ acting PM on bilateral ties

Chinese top political advisor Jia Qinglin held talks with New Zealand acting Prime Minister Bill English on Monday afternoon. The two sides vowed to further promote their ties facing its 40th anniversary.

Conveying Premier Wen Jiabao's greeting to New Zealand Prime Minister John Key, Jia spoke highly of the good development momentum of the China-New Zealand relations in recent years.

He said the countries witnessed frequent high-level visits, increasing mutual political trust, abundant trade and economic cooperation, fruitful exchanges and cooperation in technology, education, culture and tourism and closer people-to-people communication.

China and New Zealand also maintained close communication and coordination in many international and regional affairs such as dealing with global financial crisis and climate change, as well as promoting Asia-Pacific cooperation, Jia added.

He summarized the experience for the smooth development of bilateral ties as mutual respect, mutual understanding, equality and taking into consideration each other's core interests and major concern, reciprocal trade and economic cooperation, as well as friendship between the two peoples.

The two countries should give full play to the 40th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties and further deepen bilateral cooperation, Jia said.

He called on the two sides to continue to make full use of the free trade agreement and currency swap deal, in a bid to achieve the goal of bilateral trade volume reaching 20 billion New Zealand dollars (US$16.37 billion) in 2015 as soon as possible.

The chairman also proposed that the two countries should further expand their cooperation in education, technology, culture, tourism and media.

"China supports New Zealand to play an active role in international and regional affairs and is ready to enhance communication and coordination with New Zealand in multilateral mechanisms, so as to contribute to the peace and development in Asia-Pacific and the world," Jia said.

English said Jia's visit is a showcase of the closer high-level exchanges between the two countries, and is important for their further mutual understanding and cooperation.

New Zealand benefited a lot from the progress of ties with China and will promote it from a strategic point of view, he added.

English said New Zealand will further increase cooperation with China in areas including politics, economy and trade, education, tourism and aviation. He also welcomed more Chinese companies and tourists to invest and travel to the country.

After the hour-long talks, Jia and English also witnessed the signing of two cooperation deals between the two countries on investment and clean energy cooperation.

Jia arrived in Wellington on Monday afternoon, which is the second stop of his four-day official good-will visit to New Zealand.