A senior Chinese official said yesterday in Kunming, south-western Yunnan Province that China, as a member of Association of Southeast Asian Nations-Mekong River Basin Development Cooperation Program, will help push forward the progress of the Cambodia section of the planned Pan-Asia Railway Project, and is willing to offer assistance to the Cambodia section.

Liu Jiang, vice-minister in charge of the State Development and Reform Commission, made the remarks at the 5th Ministerial Meeting of the ASEAN-Mekong River Basin Development Coopera-tion Program, which closed in Kunming yesterday.

Liu called for more efforts to produce a workable plan for building and upgrading the railway project through consultations among the countries involved.

China has launched a feasibility study for the upgrading of the China section of the railway shortly after the proposal for the project was ap-proved by the ASEAN Communi-cations Ministerial Meeting in 2001.

The Pan-Asia Railway Project will link China, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia and Singapore.

The ASEAN-Mekong River Basin Development Cooperation Program was initiated in 1996.

Senior officials from China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations also agreed yesterday to further improve cooperation in ag-riculture, the information industry, human resources, investment and exploitation of the Mekong River.

After a two-day consultation in Wuyishan City, Fujian, they reached the consensus that China-ASEAN relations have good prospects and should be advanced to a new level.

In 2002, China and ASEAN signed a landmark framework agreement on cooperation, which started the construction of the China-ASEAN free trade area.

China and Thailand signed an agreement last June to abolish tariffs on 188 kinds of vegetables and fruits. China has also promised to offer favorable tariff treatment to Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.

Statistics show that trade between China and ASEAN exceeded US$50 billion in 2002. China's investment in the ASEAN countries grew at an annual rate of 60 percent.

China will formally join the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia at the leaders' meeting between ASEAN and China in Bali, Indonesia, in October.

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