On April 30, 2011, Premier of the State Council Wen Jiabao met with Secretary-General of ASEAN Surin in Jakarta.
Wen expressed admiration for Surin’s long-term committeemen to promoting the development of China-ASEAN relations. Since China and ASEAN established the dialogue relationship 20 years ago, the bilateral pragmatic cooperation in all fields has developed steadily, which helps to boost East Asian cooperation and maintain regional peace and stability, said Wen. To strengthen the good-neighborly friendship and mutually beneficial cooperation with ASEAN is an unalterable policy of the Chinese government. China expects to make concerted efforts with ASEAN to comprehensively push forward the cooperation with focus on building interconnectivity, hold successful celebrations on the 20th anniversary of China-ASEAN dialogue relationship and lift China-ASEAN strategic partnership to a new level.
He said that East Asian cooperation faces the main tasks of consolidating and deepening the existing cooperation, accelerating the construction of East Asian Free Trade Area, financial, agricultural cooperation and interconnectivity and strengthening educational and cultural exchanges among East Asian countries. In response to the outstanding diversity in the region, East Asian cooperation should follow a step-by-step approach and various mechanisms should promote each other and complement with each other’s advantages in order to play a bigger role of stimulating economic growth and realizing common prosperity. East Asia Summit should stay open and inclusive, give full play to the role of the leadership strategic forum and offer guidance on regional development and cooperation from a macro level.
Surin noted that China always attaches great importance to and supports the role of ASEAN in regional affairs. Whenever ASEAN members suffer difficulties, China is always there to help. Facts show that China is ASEAN’s trustworthy neighbor. ASEAN is willing to take the opportunity of the 20th anniversary of bilateral dialogue relationship to push forward ASEAN-China strategic partnership. Agreeing on Wen’s opinions about East Asian cooperation, Surin highly appreciates China’s important and positive role of promoting East Asian cooperation and stated that ASEAN expects to work with all the East Asian countries, including China, to speed up East Asian cooperation in the correct direction.