Meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping and President of Mongolia Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj
Trilateral talks took
place in Tashkent between President Vladimir Putin, President of the People’s
Republic of China Xi Jinping and President of Mongolia Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj.
2 of 6
Meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping and President of Mongolia Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj.
Following
the talks, the three presidents witnessed the signing of the Programme
to Establish the China-Mongolia-Russia Economic Corridor
and an agreement between Russia’s
Federal Customs Service, China’s General Administration of Customs,
and Mongolia’s General Tax and Customs Administration on mutual
recognition of customs inspection results with regard to particular
categories of goods.
* * *
President of China Xi
Jinping (retranslated): President Putin,
President Elbegdorj, it is a great pleasure to see you again.
Following
our meeting in Ufa last July, we
jointly approved the roadmap for developing our trilateral cooperation
over the medium term. Our three countries’ ministries, local authorities
and companies
are working actively to implement this roadmap and organising intensive
coordination of projects in trade, the economy, humanitarian ties,
transit
traffic, tourism and sport. The positive results are visible. Following
our
meeting today, we will witness the signing of an important cooperation
agreement – the programme to establish an economic corridor.
This all shows that we are capable of knitting
close cooperation ties as neighbours. I am happy with the way our trilateral
ties are developing. We are ready to listen to your remarks and proposals on the next steps to take.
I give the floor to President Putin.
President of Russia
Vladimir Putin: Friends,
President Xi Jinping, President Elbegdorj, I am also very pleased to see you
again.
Russia has traditionally friendly ties with
China and Mongolia. We are building our trilateral partnership on the principles
of good-neighbourliness, equality, and mutual respect.
Yes,
a year ago in Ufa, we agreed to step up
our cooperation in a broad range of areas. It is important that we have
started
implementing the roadmap to develop our trilateral contacts in politics,
the economy, international affairs, and the cultural and humanitarian
sector. We
have launched a mechanism for political consultations now and this is
a good
opportunity for coordinating our positions on current regional issues.
Building
on the Ufa agreements, we have drafted
a programme for establishing an economic corridor linking Russia, China
and Mongolia. This programme seeks to substantially intensify
cross-border ties by launching more than 30 trilateral investment
projects.
Regarding
the programme’s practical
implementation, we think Mongolia’s idea of establishing a joint
investment
planning centre is a promising idea. Its main task would be to develop
new
cooperation proposals in transport, construction of communication
and electricity transmission lines, and energy transport routes.
We
also think it important to give priority
attention to infrastructure initiatives. In particular, Russian business
is
ready to take part in modernising the Ulan Bator railway. I have
discussed this
on past occasions with the President of Mongolia. We will increase
the railway’s throughput capacity to 100 million tonnes of freight
a year. We will
also develop road freight transport. This will help us to make better
use of our countries’ transit potential.
We are sure that implementing these projects
will help to develop regional integration projects too, especially the project
to develop a Eurasian trade and economic partnership between
the Eurasian
Economic Union and the People’s Republic of China.
Further simplification of customs formalities
will help to expand the trade ties between our countries, including ties between
the border regions. The agreement on mutual recognition of customs inspections
results that will be signed today will facilitate this.
We should most certainly continue working to strengthen contacts between our three countries’ business communities. In June
last year, our countries’ chambers of commerce and industry held a successful
forum in China. The next forum, which will take in Chita, in Russia, on August 5–6, has Russia’s active support.
I want to say that we are seeing positive
changes taking place before our very eyes in environmental cooperation
throughout the entire region. I know that Mongolia plans to build
hydroelectricity facilities in the Selenga River basin. We would like to study
these plans very carefully with our friends in Mongolia and China.
Russia
and international environmental
protection organisations have made their position on these plans known:
this
project could create some risks for water supply to Russia’s Irkutsk
Region and affect the unique ecology of Lake Baikal, as Selenga is
the main river flowing
into Lake Baikal.
We
realise that Mongolia’s energy
shortage is a serious issue. Clearly, this is something we must reflect
on and we need to resolve this issue. But there are different ways
to resolve this
problem, above all by developing the entire region’s energy sector.
For example, Russian power stations could increase electricity supplies
to Mongolia’s northern regions.
We
think it important to encourage cooperation
not only in this sector but in others too, in tourism, for example.
The Federal
Tourism Agency is drafting a number of proposals. One of them is
to organise an international tourism route – the Great Tea Route – that
could link 20 Russian
regions with China and Mongolia. We could launch a special excursion
train on this route.
We will continue to do all we can to expand
scientific exchanges. The establishment of an association of research centres
in Russia, China and Mongolia will play a big part in this.
Let me say again that I think our trilateral
partnership has great potential in many areas and we should put this to more
active use for the good of our peoples.
Thank you for your attention.
President of Mongolia
Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj
(retranslated): President of China Xi
Jinping, President of Russia Vladimir Putin,
It is a great pleasure to greet you at this
third summit of the leaders of Mongolia, Russia and China here in the capital
of Uzbekistan.
Today, we will sign trilateral cooperation
agreements such as the programme on establishing an economic corridor between
Mongolia, Russia and China and the agreement between our three countries’
customs services on mutual recognition of customs inspection results with regard
to particular categories of goods. The aim of establishing the economic
corridor is to put in place conditions for expanding trilateral cooperation
through increasing trade between our three countries.
I would like to exchange views and settle the following matters during this meeting.
First
of all, this involves the implementation of a programme to create
an economic
corridor. I suggest we select those projects, out of the 32 from
the programme,
which can be implemented now, and find sources to finance them. Given
the fact
that the parties agreed to establish an investment centre to determine
funding and do a feasibility study of projects, I propose such a centre
be created in 2016.
Then,
as part of improving cooperation on roads and transport, we propose
holding
regular consultations with transport agencies of the third parties,
which are a real mechanism to promote railway projects. The second
meeting on current
issues is expected to be held in August-September in Ulan Bator.
Third,
determining
promising avenues of trilateral cooperation. Our cooperation should not
be
limited to economic corridors or transport and customs issues. One
of the directions is regional cooperation; we support in principle
China’s initiative
to develop cooperation between the eastern regions of Mongolia, Russia
and China. Mongolia is ready to develop an appropriate plan
of cooperation.
I also
believe
it possible to develop trilateral cooperation in agriculture
and emergency prevention, response and relief based on the experience
of bilateral
cooperation.
I would
like
to end my speech with a suggestion to hold a trilateral meeting in Ulan
Bator to step up our cooperation. I am confident that our mutually
advantageous
cooperation will make a significant contribution not only
to the development of the three states but the region as a whole.
Thank you
for your attention.
Xi Jinping: Thank you, President Elbegdorj.
President
Putin and President Elbegdorj presented good proposals. I suggest the relevant
agencies of the three countries carefully study and implement them.
And now I would like to share my opinion. We should comprehensively promote trilateral
cooperation by linking the Chinese Silk Road Economic Belt and Russian strategies,
in particular, the construction of a trans-Eurasian corridor, and the Mongolian
Steppe Route.
The first task is to work
responsibly on implementing the programme to create an economic corridor
linking China, Mongolia and Russia. This programme is a practical step towards
linking together our three countries’ development strategies and outlines
priorities for our business cooperation. It is important that we pursue
cooperation in areas such as transport infrastructure, building border crossing
points and production facilities, developing investment, trade and the economy,
humanitarian ties and environmental cooperation. We must work together to carry
out priority projects so as to speed up achievement of stage-by-stage results
in establishing the China-Russia-Mongolia economic corridor.
Second,
we must step up our cross-border
cooperation. Our three countries’ border regions have advantages
in terms of their geographical location, comprehensive interlinking
and cooperation
mechanisms, and they share a common great desire to develop trilateral
cooperation, have solid foundations for doing this, and could become
priority
regions for our work together. China supports our Mongolian partners’
initiative on cross-border economic cooperation.
We propose taking the existing bilateral
economic cooperation zone as a base we can build on to develop a trilateral
zone with an emphasis on infrastructure construction, comprehensive
interlinking, cross-border trade, industrialisation, tourism, and humanitarian
ties. We should strengthen our links in industry and promote sub-regional
cooperation in the interests of developing our countries’ border regions.
Third, we need to expand our cooperation within
the
SCO.
The SCO has gained steadily in international influence over its 15
years of existence. More and more countries have shown their approval
of the ‘Shanghai spirit’ and wish to develop cooperation with
the organisation in order to work together on preventing threats
and making use of development
opportunities.
The accession
process for new members we
launched at the Ufa summit last year has progressed smoothly. The number
of observers and dialogue partners is growing. This creates new
development
opportunities.
The SCO
is a useful platform for our trilateral
cooperation. Mongolia is the first observer country in the SCO. China is
ready
to work with Russia and other SCO member countries to strengthen our
cooperation with our Mongolian partners, in particular, we are ready
to work
together on implementing the openness and partnership policy as part
of the SCO’s development strategy through to 2025. We are ready
to develop our work
together with Mongolia in transit traffic, food safety, emergency
situations,
energy and other sectors.
This is my view. Overall, we have had a practical and useful discussion today.
Our Mongolian partners will chair the fourth
summit next year. China is ready to provide all-round support in this.
Thank you.
