CRI听力: China, Japan to Discuss Cooperation in Coping with the Financial Crisis

Anchor:
Meanwhile, China and Japan will convene a high profile meeting this weekend. A senior Chinese official says strengthening bilateral cooperation to cope with the financial crisis will top the agenda for the second China-Japan high-level economic dialogue. (www.hXen.com)

Xyee has more.

The second China-Japan high-level economic dialogue is scheduled to be held in Tokyo on Sunday.
Chinese vice Premier Wang Qishan and Japanese Foreign Minister Hirofumi Nakasone will co-chair the dialogue. Heads and senior officials of the two countries' relevant departments will also attend the dialogue.

In the first four months of this year, trade volume between China and Japan declined by 23% due to the unfolding global financial crisis. And Japan's direct investment in China dropped by some 15%.

Chen Deming, Chinese Commerce Minister, said on Tuesday that the two sides should work together to weather this difficult patch. He noted China and Japan will further improve the strategic reciprocal relationship in the economic and trade domains.

"We will discuss how to jointly tackle the financial crisis, in an effort to facilitate the recovery and development of both economies. Currently, the financial crisis is still spreading.

As the main economies in Asia, China and Japan should be realistic and look to the future, shoulder our common responsibilities and reinforce dialogue and cooperation."

The official said the two sides should jointly promote the regional economic and financial cooperation as well as reforms of the global financial system. Efforts should also be made to fight protectionism and maintain the healthy development of the multilateral trading system.
Chen Deming also highlighted other topics at the dialogue.

"The two sides will also discuss a wide range of topics including energy saving, environmental protection, finance, agriculture, trade and investment, intellectual property rights, information and telecommunication as well as disaster reduction and relief. We will try our best to sign related cooperation agreements, generating concrete results."

China has replaced the US as Japan's biggest trading partner, while Japan is China's third largest trading partner. By April this year, Japanese enterprises' direct investment to China had accumulated some 66 billion US dollars, making Japan China's second largest source of foreign direct investment.

The high-level economic dialogue mechanism was jointly launched by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and then Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in April 2007.

The first dialogue was held in Beijing in December 2007.

Xyee, CRI news.