The China-Philippines relationship has returned to normality after years of estrangement, as Chinese President Xi Jinping and visiting Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte agreed to comprehensively restore and improve bilateral ties during their meeting Thursday.
China pays high attention to the bilateral relationship, and is ready to work with the Philippines to enhance political mutual trust, deepen mutually beneficial cooperation and properly handle differences, noted Xi.
“During much of the time since we established diplomatic ties, our two countries properly managed our differences on the South China Sea issue through bilateral dialogues and consultations,” Xi said. “That embodies a political wisdom worth encouraging, and more importantly represents an essential consensus to anchor the healthy and stable development of our bilateral ties.”
In regard to how to improve the relationship, Xi put forth four suggestions, including increasing leadership exchanges, conducting pragmatic cooperation under the framework of the Belt and Road initiative, promoting nongovernmental contact, and strengthening cooperation on regional and multilateral affairs.
Duterte concurred with Xi’s views, saying, “The development strategies of our two countries match each other to a high degree, and cooperation between us has considerable room for growth.”
He expressed, on behalf of the Philippines’s government and people, thanks to China for the support for the Philippines’ economic and social development, and agreed with Xi that the two countries should increase contact at all levels to exchange views on national development and social governance, and advance cooperation in a number of areas, including trade, investment, and infrastructure.
He made particular mention of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), a China-proposed international financial institution that aims to support the building of infrastructure in the Asia-Pacific region, saying he hoped that the AIIB could play a bigger role in the economic development of his country.
Immediately after the meeting, a total of 13 bilateral cooperation agreements on a number of areas were signed, witnessed by the two heads of state.
Duterte arrived by his special plane in Beijing on the night of Tuesday, October 18, with a huge visiting mission, composed of government ministers, hundreds of entrepreneurs and a large media corps. Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi met Duterte at the airport where his plane landed.
Duterte was on a four-day state visit to China from October 18 to 20 at Xi's invitation. China is in fact the first country that the Philippine president has visited outside the Association of Southeast Asian Nations since taking office in June.
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