China will continue to provide Bangladesh with vaccines to meet its needs, and is ready to discuss vaccine-filling cooperation with Bangladesh to help the country fight against the pandemic.
State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi made the comment in a meeting with Bangladesh Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen in Tashkent on Thursday, the Chinese foreign ministry said. “Both sides must jointly oppose the politicisation of the Covid-19 origin tracing.”
The foreign minister is leading a delegation in Tashkent to attend an international conference on "Central and South Asia: Regional connectivity: Challenges and opportunities".
The Bangladesh foreign ministry said both sides reciprocated their appreciation to each other for exchanging video messages by President Xi Jinping and Prime Minister Hasina on the occasions of the joint program of the 100th anniversary of the Father of the Nation and Golden Jubilee of Bangladesh’s independence and the 100th anniversary of the Communist Party of China respectively.
Dr. Momen thanked the Chinese government for initiating the six-party COVID consultation and expressed Bangladesh’s gratitude to the Chinese Government for standing by the people of Bangladesh at an extremely difficult time by generosity sending vaccine doses as gifts and also opening the commercial supply line.
Dr. Momen reiterated his request to initiate vaccine coproduction in Bangladesh with partnership from Bangladeshi and Chinese stakeholders. Foreign Minister Wang Yi assured him of the Chinese government’s support on this issue.
Both the foreign ministers agreed to continue to work further towards the repatriation of the Rohingyas. They also underscored the need to resume the tripartite dialogue.
The Chinese foreign ministry said Wang Yi said that China and Bangladesh are “good neighbors and good friends”. The two countries have been treating each other as equals, showing mutual respect, deepening friendly cooperation and advancing the Belt and Road cooperation.
“China is willing to work with Bangladesh to maintain the development momentum of the China-Bangladesh strategic partnership of cooperation. China highly appreciates Bangladesh's firm support of China's legitimate stance on issues concerning China's core interests,” read Beijing's statement.
“China will continue to support Bangladesh in safeguarding national sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity, and upholding international fairness and justice and the basic norm of non-interference in internal affairs in international relations.
“China stands ready to provide support and assistance to help with Bangladesh's poverty alleviation through the China-South Asian Countries Poverty Alleviation and Cooperative Development Center.”
Dr Momen said that “Bangladesh always insists on the one-China principle and firmly supports China on issues related to China's internal affairs, such as the issues related to Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Tibet.”
“Bangladesh thanked China for its timely assistance with vaccines at a critical time. Bangladesh opposes making the search for the coronavirus origin a political issue. Bangladesh wishes to launch vaccine-filling cooperation with China, and enhance anti-pandemic cooperation under the framework of the six-nation cooperation mechanism, namely Bangladesh, China, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka,” according to Beijing.
“China has set an example of poverty alleviation for the world. Bangladesh supports the China-South Asian Countries Poverty Alleviation and Cooperative Development Center established under China's initiative, and hopes to learn from China's experience in lifting the country out of poverty. Bangladesh wishes China to continue to play a meditative and constructive role in properly resolving the Rakhine State issue.”
