Chinese Premier Li Qiang will attend a joint meeting of Southeast Asian and Gulf states in Malaysia next week as Beijing continues its push to rally support for its stance on tariffs.
Li will also visit Indonesia for three days starting on Saturday before attending the first joint meeting of leaders from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), the foreign ministry in Beijing said on Thursday.
The GCC has a membership of six Arab states, including major oil producers Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait.
“China looks forward to working with Asean and GCC countries to deepen pragmatic collaboration across various sectors … uphold the multilateral trading system and safeguard the common interests of the Global South,” ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said.
During the trip to Indonesia, Li will meet President Prabowo Subianto and other political and business leaders from Southeast Asia’s largest economy.
Prabowo visited China twice last year, and last month both countries’ foreign and defence ministers met for the first meeting of its kind.
China has been Indonesia’s largest trading partner for over a decade, with the bilateral trade volume reaching US$147.8 billion last year, according to the Chinese foreign ministry.
It is also the second-largest foreign investor in Indonesia behind only Singapore, with heavy investment in manufacturing, transport infrastructure, new energy and electric vehicles.
Source: Ampscmp