Working together toward a better future for Asia and the world

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Dear Friends,

Mankind has only one earth, and it is home to all countries. Common development, which is the very foundation of sustainable development, serves the long-term and fundamental interests of all the people in the world. As members of the same global village, we should foster a sense of community of common destiny, follow the trend of the times, keep to the right direction, stick together in time of difficulty and ensure that development in Asia and the rest of the world reaches new highs.

First, we should boldly break new ground so as to create an inexhaustible source of power for boosting common development. Over the years, many countries and regions have developed a lot of good practices in maintaining stability and promoting growth. We should continue such practices. However, nothing in the world remains constant, and as a Chinese saying goes, a wise man changes as time and event change. We should abandon the outdated mindset, break away from the old confines that fetter development and unleash all the potential for development. We should redouble efforts to shift the growth model and adjust the economic structure, raise the quality of development and make life better for the people. We should steadily advance the reform of the international economic and financial systems, improve global governance mechanisms and provide support to sound and stable global economic growth. Asia, with its long-standing capacity for adjusting to change, should ride on the waves of the times and make changes in Asia and global development reinforce and benefit each other.

Second, we should work together to uphold peace so as to provide security safeguard for boosting common development. Peace is the ever-lasting wish of our people. Peace, like air and sunshine, is hardly noticed when people are benefiting from it. But none of us can live without it. Without peace, development is out of the question. Countries, whether big or small, strong or weak, rich or poor, should all contribute their share to maintaining and enhancing peace. Rather than undercutting each other's efforts, countries should complement each other and work for joint progress. The international community should advocate the vision of comprehensive security, common security and cooperative security so as to turn our global village into a big stage for common development, rather than an arena where gladiators fight each other. And no one should be allowed to throw a region and even the whole world into chaos for selfish gains. With growing interaction among countries, it is inevitable that they encounter frictions here and there. What is important is that they should resolve differences through dialogue, consultation and peaceful negotiations in the larger interest of the sound growth of their relations.

Third, we should boost cooperation as an effective vehicle for enhancing common development. As we often say in China, a single flower does not make spring, while one hundred flowers in full blossom bring spring to the garden. All countries in the world are closely linked and share converging interests. They should both pool and share their strengths. While pursuing its own interests, a country should accommodate the legitimate concerns of others. In pursuing their own development, countries should promote the common development of all and expand common interests among them. We should enhance South-South cooperation and North-South dialogue, promote balanced development of the developing and developed countries and consolidate the foundation for sustaining stable growth of the global economy. We need to work vigorously to create more cooperation opportunities, upgrade cooperation, and deliver more development dividends to our people and contribute more to global growth.

Fourth, we should remain open and inclusive so as to create broad space for enhancing common development. The ocean is vast because it admits hundreds of rivers. We should respect the right of a country to independently choose its social system and development path, remove distrust and misgivings and turn the diversity of our world and difference among countries into dynamism and driving force for development. We should keep an open mind, draw upon development practices of other continents, share development resources and promote regional cooperation. During the first decade and more of the new century, trade within Asia has increased from $800 billion to $3 trillion, and its trade with other regions has grown from $1.5 trillion to $4.8 trillion. This shows that cooperation in Asia is open and it goes hand in hand with Asia's cooperation with other regions, and everyone has benefited from such cooperation. Asia should welcome non-Asian countries to play a constructive role in ensuring stability and development of the region. Likewise, the non-Asian countries should respect Asia's diversity and its long-standing tradition of cooperation. This will create a dynamic environment in which Asia and other regions enjoy mutually reinforcing progress.