Xi hails long history of China-India partnership

President Xi Jinping said on Friday that China and India should leverage the high-level cultural and people-to-people exchanges mechanism to help build an even closer development partnership between the two countries.

Xi made the remark in a congratulatory letter to the opening of the first meeting of the China-India High Level Mechanism on Cultural and People-to-People Exchanges in New Delhi, the capital of India, on Friday. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi also sent a congratulatory message to the meeting.

Noting that China and India both enjoy ancient civilizations as well as long histories and splendid cultures, Xi said the two civilizations have been engaging in close exchanges and mutual learning since ancient times and have jointly made significant contributions to human development and progress.

Bilateral ties are moving forward positively, and mutual political trust keeps deepening, pragmatic cooperation has been stepped up, cultural and people-to-people exchanges are developing robustly and the two countries maintain coordination in international and regional affairs, Xi said.

Practices have proved that sound China-India relations benefit the two countries and even the whole world, he added.

Xi called on the two countries to take advantage of the mechanism and the profound background of the two civilizations to promote people-to-people exchanges.

The high-level mechanism was set up as a follow-up to the decision made by Xi and Modi during their informal summit in Wuhan, Hubei province, in April.

The meeting was co-chaired by Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who is in India for a four-day visit that started on Friday.

The two sides held an extensive discussion on building greater synergies in the people-to-people ties between the two countries through exchanges in areas such as tourism, art, film, media, culture, sports and academic and youth exchanges.

Addressing the meeting, Wang said the formal launch of the mechanism is an important step by the two countries to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, an important measure to push forward the development of all-around ties between the two countries, and an important platform to realize revival of the two civilizations.

China is striving to realize the Two Centenary Goals－to build a moderately prosperous society by 2021, the 100-year anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, and to turn China into a modern socialist country by 2049, the 100-year anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China－while India is devoted to building a "New India", said Wang. The Chinese side is willing to work with the Indian side to fully coordinate under the people-to-people exchanges mechanism, use all resources, give play to their respective advantages to promote people-to-people exchanges to gain new development, and make new strides, Wang said.

Swaraj said the success of the first meeting of the high-level people-to-people exchanges mechanism pushed bilateral people-to-people exchanges to a new height and made such exchanges a stabilizer for bilateral ties.

Xi and Modi have met three times since their informal summit in April, which is seen as a sign of improvement in bilateral ties.