On June 5, 2014, Foreign Minister Wang Yi attended the sixth ministerial conference of the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum and met the Chinese and foreign journalists, expounding the outcomes of the sixth ministerial conference of the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum.
Wang Yi said that with the keynote of consolidating China-Arab friendship, the sixth ministerial conference of the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum focuses on the joint construction of the Silk Road and aims at common development and prosperity. A series of important consensuses have been reached on the major directions, priority fields, specific measures and implementation roadmap in strengthening China-Arab cooperation under the new situation, with which he and his Arab colleagues are all satisfied.
Wang Yi said that the ministerial conference boasts an unprecedentedly high level as President Xi Jinping attended the opening ceremony and delivered a keynote speech for the first time, and His Highness Prime Minister Jaber Al-Mubarak Al-Hamad Al-Sabah of Kuwait and 20 ministers including foreign ministers from the Arab states attended the conference. The grand conference fully reflects the solid foundation of China-Arab friendship and the earnest expectations of both sides to develop China-Arab friendship. It can be said that both sides have become closer and more intimate at the Forum as the Arab states are turning to "look at the East" while China is speeding up to "open up to the West".
Wang Yi said that it is the common aspiration of both China and the Arab states to consolidate political mutual trust and enhance strategic cooperation. President Xi Jinping proposed that China will stick to the "four adherences" to the Arab friends under the new situation, which is a comprehensive and systematic declaration of the new Chinese government's policy toward the Arab states.
Wang Yi pointed out that both sides have signed three important documents including the "Beijing Declaration", the "Action Plan for 2014 to 2016" and the "Development Plan for 2014 to 2024", proposing cooperation ideas, cooperation measures and cooperation routes on how to achieve mutual benefits and win-win results between China and the Arab states. Among the documents, the "Development Plan" puts forward the overall objective and advancement direction for the development of the China-Arab relations and determines 15 key cooperation fields such as economy and trade, energy, culture, industry, agriculture, science and technology, health care, education, press and publication, infrastructure, aerospace, environmental protection and non-governmental exchanges. The "Action Plan" stipulates that in the following two years, both sides will continue well organizing the seven major institutional activities such as the China-Arab Business Conference and Investment Seminar, China-Arab Energy Cooperation Conference, Seminar on China-Arab Inter-civilization Dialogue, China-Arab Friendship Conference, China-Arab Press Cooperation Forum, and China-Arab Senior Health Officials' Meeting. It also determines that in the following two years, both sides will focus on eight major cooperation intents such as establishing China-Arab senior officials' strategic dialogues, promoting the construction of the free trade area between China and the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf, establishing China-Arab Technical Training Center of Desertification Prevention and Control, and implementing China-Arab Scientific and Technological Partnership Program.
Wang Yi stressed that it is the highlight of this conference to plan the future development of the China-Arab relations through jointly building the "One Belt One Road" (the "Silk Road Economic Belt" and the "Maritime Silk Road of the 21st Century"). The construction of a "1+2+3" cooperation pattern proposed by President Xi Jinping is a historic opportunity to lead the development of the China-Arab relations and the Forum. China is willing to integrate its own development closely with the development of the Arab states to form a "community of common interests" and a "community of common destiny" featuring mutual benefits and reciprocity and seeking common development.
Wang Yi said that the sixth ministerial conference is a new starting point and new opportunity for comprehensively deepening China-Arab collective cooperation. Both sides should work together to jointly welcome an even better new decade of the China-Arab relations and the development of the Forum.