World Bank takes to Belt and Road

World Bank President Jim Yong Kim (L) speaks at the opening press conference of the 2017 World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) Spring Meetings in Washington DC, April 20, 2017. China is still embracing open trade, as the country has lifted millions of people out of poverty through engaging more and more in trade, said World Bank President Jim Yong Kim on Thursday. [Photo/Xinhua]

"That happened when it embraced the global market, when it opened itself to competition, when it engaged more and more in trade," Kim said, without naming the United States and some European nations, where protectionism sentiment has been running strong.

Kim said trade has been an extremely important part of global economic growth and an extremely important part of the poverty reduction in the last 30 years.

"We continue to argue that freer trade, more openness, is actually critical for the future of the world, and there may be individual countries that choose to look inward, but just because those individual countries look inward doesn't mean everyone else is going to look inward," he said.

Kim cited China as "a good example". "China is not going to stop trading with all of its trading partners and it's not going to stop continuing to work with Latin America. China's work in those countries has only gone up over the last few years, and I think it will go up further," he said.