The 10th Ministerial Conference of the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum will be held in Beijing on May 30. Chinese President Xi Jinping will attend the opening ceremony, and Foreign Minister Wang Yi will co-chair the meeting with Chair of Arab League Council and Mauritanian Foreign Minister Salem Ould Merzoug. For Somalia, Foreign Minister Ahmed Moallim Fiqi will join his counterparts of China and other Arab countries to explore visions and avenues of deepening China-Arab cooperation.
Established 20 years ago, China-Arab States Cooperation Forum has opened a new chapter of strengthening dialogues and cooperation to promote peace and development for China and Arab countries. Over the past 20 years, remarkable progresses have been made in cooperation under the framework of the Forum, with 19 mechanisms formed including ministerial meetings, senior official meetings and senior official strategic political dialogues, etc., ranging widely from politics, economy and trade, energy to culture, science and technology, health, media, and people-to-people exchanges. 85 outcome documents in various fields have been published to guide and frame the joint commitment to continuously enriching the strategic core of our relationship and deepening as well as materializing our cooperation.
In 2022, leaders of China and Arab countries came to the agreement on committing to building a China-Arab community with a shared future in the new era, which marked the implementing and thriving of the concept of a community with a shared future for mankind in Arab world. Since then, China and Arab countries have been continuously deepening mutual political trust, vitalizing pragmatic cooperation and diversifying cultural exchanges, with rich outcomes yielded in various fields.
China and Arab countries support each other’s independence. We firmly support each other in safeguarding core interests. Our two sides both stand for respect for sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity, mutual non-aggression, non-interference in internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, as well as peaceful coexistence, both oppose external interference and all forms of hegemonism and both advocate respecting and supporting the right to independently choose development paths based on national conditions.
China and Arab countries jointly hold high multilateralism. Our both sides always firmly uphold the international system with the UN at its core, the international order underpinned by international law and the basic norms of international relations underpinned by the UN Charter. We jointly champion multilateralism, promote multilateral cooperation, and oppose unilateralism and power politics, advocate the democratization of international relations and support developing countries’ greater representation and voice in global governance.
China and Arab countries jointly promote peace and security. China actively advocates the vision of common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security, adheres to the principles of non-interference, political settlement, objectivity and justice, as well as solution to both consequences and causes. Therefore, China has found the Chinese way to address hotspot issues and practiced it successfully together with Arab countries. China has mediated and contributed to the resumption of diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran, ushering in a “tide of reconciliation” in the Middle East. At the invitation of China, representatives of Fatah and Hamas held in-depth and candid talks in Beijing for Palestinian reconciliation and achieved encouraging progress. China firmly supports the just cause of the Palestinian people to restore their legitimate national rights and has always been advocating for a comprehensive, fair and lasting solution to the Palestinian issue.
China and Arab countries jointly practice mutual learning among civilizations. As ancient civilizations, China and Arab countries both champion equality, mutual learning, dialogue, and inclusiveness between civilizations, and thus have set a model of mutual learning between civilizations. In 2023, President Xi Jinping put forward the Global Civilization Initiative, which was echoed by Arab countries with enthusiasm. The Arab League became the first regional organization to jointly issue a document with China to implement the initiative. Among the 19 cooperation mechanisms under the framework of the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum, 11 are related to cultural exchanges. 50 Chinese and Arab classics have been published under the "Chinese-Arabic Classics Translation" project. Young people from Somalia, Egypt, together with youth of other countries, participated in the "Tiangong Dialogue", providing testimony to the global commitment of China's aerospace development in Arab world.
Somalia is an important member of the Arab countries and China-Arab cooperation. The cooperation and exchanges between China and Somalia under the China-Arab cooperation framework have become an integral part of our bilateral relations which has substantially contributed to the consolidation and expansion of our traditional friendship. China is ready to work with Somalia and other Arab countries to embrace the new prospects and dynamism of China-Arab relations, so as to build with every effort a China-Arab community with a shared future in the new era as a part of the efforts in building mankind’s community with a shared future.
Author: H.E. CHEN Wendi, Acting Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China to the Federal Republic of Somalia