China shares new development opportunities with South Asian nations: Sri Lankan official

COLOMBO, June 30 (Xinhua) -- China is sharing new development opportunities with South Asian countries and is committed to achieving win-win outcomes, said Wasantha Samarasinghe, Sri Lankan minister of trade, commerce, food security and cooperative development.

Samarasinghe made the remarks in an interview with Xinhua after returning to Colombo from the 9th China-South Asia Expo in Kunming, south China's Yunnan Province.

The minister noted that the expo fully demonstrated China's achievements in economic development, scientific and technological innovation, and technological transformation.

As the theme country for the expo this year, Sri Lanka highly values cooperation opportunities with China and looks forward to learning from China's development experience and further deepening bilateral economic and trade relations.

"This is my eighth visit to China since 2005. Over these 20 years, there is a big difference and big development in China's economy, cities, and people's living standards," Samarasinghe said.

He added that while achieving its own development, China has steadfastly advanced high-level opening-up, continuously injecting stability and certainty into the world economy. There is no other country like China that has provided such important development opportunities for the entire South Asia, he said.

Samarasinghe specifically highlighted the 8th meeting of the China-Sri Lanka Joint Committee for Economic and Trade Cooperation held in Colombo, where both sides signed a memorandum of understanding on strengthening economic cooperation in industrial and supply chains.

"Time to time, the world is going here and there. In this situation, the stability of industrial and supply chains is crucial," said the official.

Deepening alignment with China's industrial and supply chains will help enhance Sri Lanka's capacity building and create significant development opportunities in industry, technology, business, and infrastructure, he said.

Samarasinghe said Sri Lanka, with its geographical advantage in a crucial position along Indian Ocean shipping routes, will gain new opportunities by deepening cooperation with China.

"We have a good traditional friendship with China," he said, concluding with the wish to continue expanding bilateral investment and economic and trade cooperation and creating more benefits for the people of both countries.