Premier Wen Jiabao, at the invitation of Lao Prime Minister Bouasone Bouphavanh, will pay a working visit to Laos and attend the 3rd Summit of the Greater Mekong Subregion Economic Cooperation Program (GMS) in Vientiane from March 29 to 31, 2008.

On the morning of March 26, 2008, Assistant Foreign Minister He Yafei held a briefing for journalists from home and abroad and information officers of foreign embassies in China on the upcoming visit of Premier Wen. Deputy Director-General of the Information Department Qin Gang chaired the briefing.

He Yafei said that the visit, as the first paid by Premier Wen after the new Chinese government is formed, is an important diplomatic activity with the neighboring country and of great significance to promoting the all-round and in-depth development of China-Laos relations, deepening the good-neighborly friendship between China and countries in the Greater Mekong Subregion and boosting the Subregion cooperation.

On Premier Wen's visit to Laos, He noted that China and Laos are friendly neighboring countries linked by common mountains and rivers and enjoy a long tradition of friendship. The bilateral relations have achieved long-term progress in recent years with frequent exchange of high-level visits and fruitful cooperation in various fields. Both countries hope to consolidate the traditional friendship, strengthen the pragmatic cooperation and push forward the friendly and cooperative relations through the visit. Premier Wen paid last visit to Laos just four years ago, which well demonstrates the importance China attaches to reinforcing the good-neighborly friendship with Laos. The purpose of the visit is to cement the pragmatic cooperation in various fields and raise China-Laos relations to a higher level in the spirit of "deepening friendly ties with neighboring countries and stepping up mutually beneficial cooperation".

During the visit, Premier Wen will meet with Lao President Choummaly Saygnasone and hold talks with Prime Minister Bouasone Bouphavanh. The two sides will review the achievements of bilateral cooperation, raise suggestions on enhancing the cooperation, push for progress of cooperation in key areas and exchange opinions on the international and regional issues of common concern. Wen and Bouasone will jointly attend the signing ceremonies of the bilateral economic and technological cooperation agreement, the road maintenance and upgrading program document exchange, the coal-fired power plant financing memorandum and the e-government network commercial contract. It is believed that the visit of Premier Wen to Laos will greatly strengthen the bilateral good-neighborly friendship and all-round partnership.

He Yafei introduced the background of GMS. With six member countries including China, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Viet Nam, GMS was founded in 1992 with the purpose of strengthening economic ties, eradicating poverty and promoting development. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is the initiator, coordinator and major financier of GMS. GMS has nine high priority cooperation areas of transport, energy, telecommunications, environment, agriculture, tourism, human resource development, trade facilitation and investment. By December 2007, GMS has implemented 180 projects mobilizing around US$10 billion with priorities on transport corridor, GMS Agreement for the Facilitation of Cross-Border Transport of Goods and People and its annexes and protocols, power Interconnection and trade, GMS information highway and bio-diversity protection corridor. GMS holds summit, ministerial, senior official and task force level meetings, and the ADB plays the function of the secretariat. The GMS summit is hosted every three years in turn by the member countries in the alphabetical order. The Phnom Penh summit and Kunming summit have been held in Cambodia and China in 2002 and 2005 respectively.

He said that China attaches great importance to and actively participates in GMS cooperation and has made due contributions to promoting such cooperation, especially in the priority areas of transport, energy and telecommunications. China always plays an active role of advocating, building and providing assistance. China has participated in and financed the infrastructure projects of south-north economic corridor, GMS information highway and navigation channel improvement on the upper Mekong River. China makes joint efforts with all parties concerned to push for progress of cooperation in such fields as power interconnection and trade, transport and trade facilitation, bio-diversity protection corridor, animal disease control and joint prevention and control of infectious disease. It gives priority to human resources development and actively helps other GMS countries with capacity building and training. China hosted the 2nd GMS summit in Kunming, Yunnan in July 2005. Yunnan province and Guangxi autonomous region are the two major provinces of China participating in GMS cooperation projects.

Talking about Premier Wen's attendance of the 3rd GMS summit, He noted that the theme of the summit is "Enhancing Competitiveness through Greater Connectivity". On the afternoon of March 30, Premier Wen will visit the GMS ecological tourism and environment projects and the youth photography exhibition, attend the dialogues of leaders with youth and business community representatives respectively and exchange opinions with them on GMS cooperation. On the morning of March 31, Premier Wen will participate in the opening ceremony of the GMS summit, the close-door meeting of leaders, the open-to-traffic and cutting-ribbon ceremony of Laos section of Kunming-Bangkok road, address the completion ceremony of the first phase of GMS information highway and witness the signing of related cooperation agreements. He will also sign the Leaders Declaration together with officials of other GMS countries. At the close-door meeting, Premier Wen will comprehensively expound China's proposition on GMS cooperation and future development, make introductory speech under the first topic "strengthening interconnectivity of infrastructure" and describe China's initiatives and measures on infrastructure, trade and transport facilitation, health and human resources development. He will meet with leaders of related countries and international organizations during the summit.

He Yafei then answered questions of the journalists. On the question of China's development efforts concerning the Lancang River, He said that China and other GMS countries are friendly neighbors linked by common mountains and rivers and it serves the interest of all the GMS countries to reasonably develop and utilize Lancang River-Mekong River resources. As a country in the upper reach, we will never do anything hurting the interest of lower reach countries. When making development efforts, China always attaches great importance to and takes care of the concerns of lower reach countries and maintains sound communications with nations concerned. In the future, we expect to continue to strengthen communications and coordination with parties concerned on the basis of consultation on an equal footing and mutual benefit, try to reduce and solve the problems encountered in the process of Mekong River development and jointly promote the economic development and cooperation in the Subregion.