BEIJING, April 30 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping said on Thursday that China firmly supports the Czech Republic's fight against COVID-19.
Xi told Czech President Milos Zeman in a telephone conversation that China is ready to share coronavirus containment information and experience with the Czech side via bilateral channels and the mechanism for cooperation between China and Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs), among others.
Xi said that China has made arduous efforts and achieved important strategic achievement in combating the COVID-19 epidemic, noting that it is pushing for a nationwide resumption of work and production while keeping up with the efforts in epidemic prevention and control.
Xi recalled that at the critical time when the Chinese people were making an all-out effort to battle the outbreak, President Zeman called on all walks of life in the Czech society to donate money or goods, and dispatched a flight to send anti-epidemic supplies to China, demonstrating true friendship towards the Chinese people.
The Chinese leader stressed that the human race is a community with a shared future that goes through thick and thin together, particularly when facing a pandemic, adding that China is willing to work with the Czech Republic and the wider international community to actively implement joint prevention and control measures to contain the spread of the virus, and strengthen macroeconomic policy coordination at the same time, so as to jointly tackle the challenges to the global economy brought by the COVID-19 outbreak, and firmly safeguard international equity and justice as well as the basic norms of international relations.
Xi said he believes that with the concerted efforts by the international community, the human kind will eventually defeat the disease.
On the bilateral relationship, Xi said its sound development is in the fundamental interests of the two countries and the two peoples.
China attaches great importance to developing its ties with the Czech Republic and is willing to work together with the Czech side to constantly boost their strategic partnership, he added.
Xi also said he is looking forward to meeting with Zeman after the COVID-19 pandemic is over to jointly plan for the future of China's relations with the Czech Republic and the CEECs.
Zeman, for his part, said that China has successfully brought the novel coronavirus epidemic under control and its economy has shown good prospects for development.
While expressing gratitude to China for providing valuable support and assistance to the Czech Republic in fighting the epidemic, he said that the friendship between the two countries is deep-rooted, and the two peoples share friendly feelings towards each other.
Zeman said that as a sincere friend of China, he will make great efforts to promote bilateral cooperation to ensure that the relations between the two countries will ward off distractions and keep moving forward. He added that he looks forward to visiting China again soon.
