China, Serbia vow to upgrade strategic partnership to new level

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang (front L) reviews a guard of honour with Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic (R) during a welcoming ceremony before their talks in Belgrade, Serbia, Dec 17, 2014. [Photo/Xinhua]

He also thanked China for its long-term assistance and support to Serbia.

Serbia is willing to enhance interaction with China both on bilateral level and within the framework of the China-CEE cooperation and to implement consensus and agreements reached by both sides, he said.

Serbia will work with China and Hungary to speed up the construction of the Hungary-Serbia railway project, he said, welcoming more investments from the Chinese business.

After the talks, Li and Vucic witnessed the signing of a number of cooperative agreements in the areas of economic and technical cooperation, energy, finance, aviation and culture.

Also on Wednesday, Li met the press jointly with Vucic. The Chinese leader stressed that the construction of the Hungary-Serbia railway will vigorously scale up China-Europe trade, speed up the development of countries along the route and the entire Central and Eastern Europe, so as to boost the balanced development within Europe and enrich the China-EU comprehensive partnership.

Vucic, for his part, reaffirmed that Serbia is willing to further develop its strategic partnership with China on the basis of mutual respect and equality, and well implement various cooperative agreements with China.

The Serbian side will work with other related countries in the region to advance the construction of the Hungary-Serbia railway and China-Europe land-sea express passage, the Serbian prime minister told the press.

Li arrived here Monday for the third China-CEE leaders' meeting, and an official visit to Serbia.

He flew to Serbia after wrapping up a visit to Kazakhstan in his three-nation trip, which will also take him to Thailand.