Ladies and Gentlemen,
Asia and Europe, once cradles of ancient civilization, are important forces in today’s world and playing a very important role in upholding peace and promoting human development. Asia, with its large population and rich resources as well as a broad market and a vibrant economy, is one of the regions with the greatest development potentials. Europe is the largest developed economy with advanced technologies, abundant capital and a high degree of economic integration. With the easing of overall situation in today’s world, Asian and European countries face rare development opportunities and a host of challenges as well. As important forces in the trend towards multi-polarization and players in economic globalization, Asia and Europe have become more interconnected and interdependent than ever before, thus giving Asia-Europe cooperation unprecedented urgency and strategic significance. Since ASEM was inaugurated 12 years ago, its members have improved cooperation mechanism, expanded areas of cooperation, enriched the contents and produced more results, giving a strong boost to political and security dialogue, business cooperation, and cultural and people-to-people exchanges among Asian and European partners. We applauded the progress ASEM has made and believe that, in this new era, to strengthen dialogue and cooperation between Asia and Europe is not only in the fundamental interests of the two sides, but also conducive to peace, development and cooperation of the whole world.
Parliamentarians represent the people, and parliaments represent the popular will. Inter-parliamentary exchanges are an important part of state-to-state relations, and multilateral parliamentary cooperation plays a unique role in international cooperation. Since its inception, ASEP membership has increased from 26 to 43. We have held four meetings, and issued declarations expounding our common position on some important international and regional issues. This has promoted inter-parliamentary dialogue, exchanges and cooperation among ASEM members, and played an active role in promoting ASEM process. It is fair to say that ASEP is maturing and becoming an important platform to strengthen dialogue, increase mutual trust and advance cooperation among parliaments of ASEM members. ASEP Has tremendous cooperation potentials and promises a bright future. Concerning its future growth, I wish to share with you the following questions:
First, uphold the framework of ASEM. ASEM is a trans-regional dialogue and cooperation process covering a wide range of areas. ASEP is an important channel and component of Asia-Europe exchanges. Guided by the purposes of ASEP, we should develop closer links with ASEM and strengthen cooperation and coordination with other cooperation mechanisms, work towards the fundamental goal and major tasks of ASEM and give full play to the positive role of the multilateral parliamentary exchanges in advancing multilateral cooperation process. We should draw up the theme of the ASEM with reference to the agenda and priority cooperation area of the ASEM Summit, actively and effectively participate in the ASEM process and push it forward, and jointly advance the new type of Comprehensive Asia-Europe Partnership.