Xi Jinping, President, People’s Republic of China: Viewpoint

Viewpoint: Xi Jinping

Arab states are China’s important partners in following the peaceful development path, strengthening unity and cooperation among developing countries and establishing a new type of international relations, with win-win cooperation at its core. China has always approached China-Arab relations strategically. It is China’s long-held diplomatic principle to consolidate and deepen the traditional China-Arab friendship.

There will be a joint effort by China and Arab countries to promote the Belt and Road Initiative under the principles of wide consultation, joint contribution and shared benefit. China and Arab countries will adopt the “1+2+3” cooperation pattern to upgrade pragmatic cooperation by taking energy cooperation as the core, infrastructure construction and trade and investment facilitation as the two wings, and high and new technologies in the fields of nuclear energy, space satellites and new energy as the three breakthroughs.

Following the principle of market-oriented business operation in which enterprises serve as the main player and the government as facilitator, we will combine China’s advantage of production capacity with the demands of Arab states, and will carry out advanced, suitable, effective employment-oriented and environmentally friendly production capacity cooperation, and support their efforts to realise industrialisation.

On the basis of equality and mutually beneficial cooperation, we encourage and support the expansion and optimisation of mutual investment by enterprises from the two sides. We will expand cooperation areas, diversify cooperation methods, broaden investment and financing channels and strengthen cooperation on two-way investment and financing through equities and debts, as well as the use of loans, mezzanine financing, direct investment and funds. China is ready to continue providing foreign-aid loans on favourable terms to Arab countries, as well as exporting credit and overseas investment insurance. We will push for the signing of agreements on avoiding double taxation and tax evasion with Arab countries, thus creating a sound and convenient investment environment to investors from both sides, protecting their rights and interests.

We support the entry of more non-oil products from Arab states into the Chinese market. We will continue to improve the trade structure and push for the sustained and steady development of two-way trade. We will strengthen exchanges and consultations between Chinese and Arab trade authorities, complete the China-GCC free trade agreement (FTA) negotiations and sign an FTA at an early date. We will oppose trade protectionism and actively remove non-tariff trade barriers, properly resolve trade disputes and frictions through friendly consultations, and gradually establish bilateral and multilateral mechanisms of early warning for trade disputes and cooperation on trade remedies. We will step up cooperation on inspection and quarantine, speed up the alignment of standards, enhance personnel exchanges and training, and jointly crack down on fake and shoddy goods in imports and exports.

We will carry out energy cooperation on the basis of reciprocity and mutual benefit, promote and support investment cooperation with Arab countries in the field of petroleum and natural gas – in particular, investment cooperation on oil prospecting, extraction, transportation and refining – and advance the collaborative overlaps of oilfield engineering technology service, equipment trade, and industrial standards. We will strengthen cooperation on renewable energy such as solar energy, wind energy and hydropower. We will jointly build the China-Arab clean energy training centre and develop all-round cooperation in related areas.

With regard to infrastructure construction, we encourage and support broader participation by Chinese companies and financial institutions in such areas as railways, highways, ports, aviation, power, communications, the BeiDou Navigation Satellite system, satellite ground stations and other infrastructure projects.

Excerpt from China’s Arab Policy Paper released in 2016