On September 5 local time, Vice Premier Wang Yang and Deputy Prime Minister Yury Trutnev of Russia, as Chinese and Russian chairmen of the Regional Cooperation Council of North-East China and Russian Far East, co-hosted its first meeting in Vladivostok.
Wang Yang said that the first Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) achieved a great success. In particular, President Vladimir Putin's introduction to the strategic considerations and policy measures of Russia on the development of the Far East at the EEF further enhanced confidence of Chinese enterprises to participate in development cooperation in the Far East. To promote development cooperation in the Far East, the two heads of state reached important consensus during their meeting in Moscow this May, and agreed to establish the Regional Cooperation Council of North-East China and Russian Far East. The mechanism is very high-level with extensive participation of various departments. It is believed that both sides will play fully the role of this mechanism and make it one major channel for promoting China-Russia development cooperation in the Far East.
Wang Yang pointed out that development of the Far East is a systematic project. Both sides should endeavor to realize common development of China's northeastern provinces and Russia's Far East through development cooperation in the Far East. We should innovate our mode of cooperation. The Chinese side is willing to actively participate in investment, construction and operational cooperation of free port and leap-forward development zone in Vladivostok thus forge several distinctive cooperation demonstration zones. We should expand the financing channels. The Chinese side encourages domestic commercial and policy-based financial institutions to participate in development cooperation in the Far East. China is planning to establish an investment fund for China-Russia regional cooperation and development and will focus its support on projects concerning the Far East development cooperation. We should identify cooperation priorities. The Chinese side stands ready to cooperate with Russia in major development fields identified by Russia in ways that Russia considers appropriate, with an emphasis on setting up projects at an early date and yielding early results in fields like port logistics, deep processing of resources, processing of agricultural products, scientific research and education, hotel construction and tourism and transportation infrastructure construction. We should remove obstacles in our cooperation. Apart from releasing political signals, we still need to take practical measures to dispel worries of enterprises and fortify confidence of enterprises in both countries in expanding investment cooperation.
Yury Trutnev expressed that the Russian side stands ready to work in tandem with China to enhance communication and coordination on policies, and earnestly promote mutually beneficial cooperation in various fields between Russia's Far East and China's northeastern provinces. Russia will offer convenience to and create a sound business environment for Chinese enterprises investing in Russia.
Both sides conducted in-depth discussion on specific topics in promoting cooperation and reached broad consensus. After the meeting, Wang Yang and Yury Trutnev signed minutes of the meeting and jointly met the press.
On the same day, Wang Yang and Yury Trutnev jointly attended the opening ceremony of the round-table meeting between Chinese and Russian business circles and made a speech respectively, encouraging enterprises in both countries to dovetail projects and promote cooperation.