Chinese FM holds phone talks with Singaporean counterpart

BEIJING, Nov. 22 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Wednesday held a phone conversation with Singaporean Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan.

In his talks with Wang, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, Balakrishnan said that Singapore and China have close relations and in-depth cooperation, and the Singaporean side is ready to take new measures to facilitate personnel exchanges and increase flights between the two countries.

Singapore, Balakrishnan added, is prepared to work with China to give full play to the role of the China-Singapore bilateral cooperation mechanism meetings and further deepen bilateral cooperation.

The Chinese foreign minister said that under the strategic guidance of the leaders of the two countries, the China-Singapore relationship has been upgraded to an all-round high-quality future-oriented partnership, with cooperation in various fields maintaining a strong momentum.

China is ready to work with Singapore to provide more favorable conditions for further resumption of their personnel exchanges, make up for the losses inflicted by the pandemic during the past three years as soon as possible, and push bilateral cooperation to a higher level, Wang said.

The two sides should make good use of bilateral cooperation mechanisms, and push for more results in their cooperation, he added.

Expressing congratulations on the success of the San Francisco summit between the heads of state of China and the United States, the Singaporean foreign minister said that Singapore and ASEAN countries are all happy to see the meeting take place, on which ASEAN has issued a statement.

China-U.S. relations are vital to the world, and the decoupling of the two will exert a serious negative impact on the world, he added.

The two sides also exchanged views on international and regional issues of mutual concern.