PR99565

BEIJING, Feb. 13, 2023 /PRNewswire=KYODO JBN/ --

Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Cambodia Hun Sen, who is also the old friend

and good friend of the Chinese people, paid a three-day official visit to China

after the Chinese New Year.

From February 9 to 11, apart from meeting with Chinese leaders, Hun Sen

attended the launching ceremony of the China-Cambodia Friendship Year and the

opening ceremony of the China-Cambodia business, investment and tourism forum

and witnessed the signing of a series of cooperation documents, covering fields

including diplomacy, economy and trade, development cooperation, agricultural

products, infrastructure and media.

On the occasion of the 65th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic

relations, China and Cambodia are ready to further bilateral cooperation

through "one position, six-way cooperation and two corridors," Chinese Vice

Foreign Minister Sun Weidong told China Media Group (CMG) on Friday.

One position

China and Cambodia on Saturday issued a joint statement on building a

China-Cambodia community with a shared future in the new era, a key consensus

the two sides reached during Hun Sun's visit.

The statement read "no matter how the international landscape may evolve, China

and Cambodia will unswervingly deepen their iron-clad friendship, carry out

mutually beneficial and win-win practical cooperation and promote the building

of a community with a shared future."

This echoed the Chinese president's call during his meeting with Hun Sen, as Xi

Jinping stressed China is ready to share opportunities, seek cooperation, and

promote development with Cambodia and urged efforts to building a high-quality,

high-level, and high-standard China-Cambodia community with a shared future in

the new era for bringing more benefits to the two peoples and contributing more

positive energy to regional peace, stability and development.

For his part, Hun Sen said he wants to send a clear message through his visit

three years ago and the current visit that the Cambodian people will always

stand firmly with the Chinese people. He vowed to push for more achievements of

the Cambodia-China comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership and jointly

build a Cambodia-China community with a shared future.

Six-way cooperation

During Hun Sun's visit, the two sides also reached a consensus on the

China-Cambodia "Diamond Hexagon" cooperation framework.

As the Chinese president noted, the two sides could build a cooperation

framework in politics, production capacity, agriculture, energy, security, and

people-to-people and cultural exchanges. Hun Sen fully agreed with China's

proposal of the cooperation framework.

The cooperation framework is written into the joint statement with detailed

cooperation plans for the six major areas.

Thus, the two sides have already taken practical actions in some areas. The

China-Cambodia business, investment and tourism forum, which Hun Sun attended,

attracted some 300 government and business representatives from the two

countries.

The forum aims to provide the latest information on the two sides' policies on

trade, investment and tourism, and serve as a platform to discuss, exchange

experiences and connect with potential business partners to foster cooperation.

According to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, China has continued to be

Cambodia's largest trading partner for 11 consecutive years with bilateral

trade volume hitting a record high again in 2022, expanding 17.5 percent year

on year to $16.02 billion.

Cambodia has also pinned high hopes for its tourism recovery after Chinese

tourists gradually returned to the Southeast Asian nation. China was the

largest source of foreign tourists to Cambodia in the pre-pandemic era.

According to Cambodia's Tourism Minister Thong Khon, his country received

25,000 Chinese tourists in January and will try to attract between 800,000 and

one million Chinese tourists in 2023.

Two corridors

As highlighted in the joint statement, the two countries also agreed to focus

on the building of two corridors: the industrial development corridor centered

on Sihanoukville Province and the fish-rice corridor in the Tonle Sap Lake area.

To build an industrial development corridor, China will encourage more Chinese

firms to invest in Cambodia and facilitate the Sihanoukville Special Economic

Zone (SSEZ), Xi told Hun Sen.

The 11-square-km SSEZ currently houses approximately 170 factories across the

world with a total investment of more than $1.3 billion, creating around 30,000

jobs.

As Xi urged efforts to carry out agricultural cooperation near lakes, the two

countries agreed to jointly build the fish-rice corridor with a

multi-dimensional, composite and efficient modern agricultural system.

According to a report released by the Cambodian Ministry of Agriculture,

Forestry and Fisheries, China is one of the key importers of Cambodia's

agricultural produce in 2022. About 689,702 tonnes of Cambodian agricultural

products had been shipped to China during the January-November period in 2022.

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2023-02-11/A-new-era-for-the-China-Cambodia-community-with-a-shared-future-1hleq3RGKha/index.html

SOURCE: CGTN