Excellencies,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Good evening!

It is my great pleasure to invite friends from Israeli government, business circle and media to come to this gathering, to review the traditional friendship between the Chinese and Jewish peoples as well as between the People's Republic of China and the State of Israel, to prepare for the 15th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relationship between China and Israel, and to initiate new thinking for the further development of our bilateral friendly cooperation.

During my stay in Israel for the last two and a half years, I am deeply impressed by the Israelis' growing interest in China. I have been "forced" to become a speechmaker by the Israelis' enthusiasm in getting to know China. Wherever I go, be it university, enterprise, municipality or kibbutz, people always keep me talking until my voice becomes hoarse.

Basically, I think China attracts so much attention because of the tremendous changes that have taken place in less than thirty years, made only possible by the reform and opening-up policy. Indeed, from 1978 to 2005, China's GDP increased by 11 times, from 200 billion US dollars to 2,200 billion dollars. Its GDP per capita increased from 220 dollars to 1,700 dollars. Last year, China's foreign trade amounted to 1.4 trillion dollars. As of last February, China's foreign reserves stood at 850 billion dollars. China has succeeded in feeding its 1.3 billion population, relieving over 200 million people from poverty, and extending nine-year compulsory education system to almost every corner of the country. The Chinese government provides assistance to more than 60 million people with disabilities and offers equal development opportunities to all 56 ethnic groups. China now enjoys social stability. And the Chinese people are pursuing prosperity in peace.

More significantly, China is exploring and pursuing a path of peaceful development, the essence of which is that China seeks to develop itself by securing a peaceful international environment, while at the same time, promoting world peace through its own development. China will rely on its own strength, reform and innovation to achieve development. Meanwhile, it remains open to the world. China conducts exchanges and cooperation with other countries on the basis of equality and mutual benefit, in order to achieve a win-win situation and common development. China's development is a development of peace, open, cooperation and harmony in nature.

Despite all China has achieved, we remain a developing country facing many challenges. Big population, low productivity and unbalanced regional development are the basic facts of China's current situation. China still ranks behind the 100th place in terms of per capita GDP. And 23.65 million of its rural population still lives in poverty. China needs to provide jobs for close to 24 million people every year. And over 100 million rural labor force in surplus needs to be transferred to other sectors. China still needs a long time and unremitting efforts and scientific thinking to develop before it achieves modernization. Therefore, the National People's Congress earlier this year approved "The 11th Five-Year Plan" of the national economic and social development for 2006-2010. In the next five years, China will stick to a scientific approach in guiding the overall economic and social advancement, make greater efforts in speeding up our reform and opening-up, strengthen creativity and the ability to take new initiatives, promote the readjustment of the economic and social structures and the transformation of economic growth modes, and enhance the effectiveness of the economic growth, so that all people can benefit from the achievements of our reform and development.

By firmly pursuing the path of peaceful development and concentrating in construction and development, China is not only growing in strength but also creating more opportunities for the whole world. And I think China and Israel are definitely able to build such a model of cooperating hand in hand while achieving mutual prosperity.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Both Chinese and Jewish civilizations are brilliant and have long histories. The friendship between Chinese and Jewish peoples has lasted from generation to generation and been constantly renewed. In the past 14 years since the establishment of bilateral diplomatic relationship, our two countries have developed omni-directional ties in political, economic, military, scientific, educational and cultural fields. The bilateral trade increased from 50 million dollars in 1992 to 3 billion dollars in 2005. The amount of Israeli FDI programs in China reached 204. At least 800 Israeli companies are doing business in China. And recently more and more venture capitals aimed at Chinese market. We have various cooperative forms in the agriculture area, such as joint research and development, import of equipments, training, and demonstration farms. Our efforts to learn from Israel bore sweet fruits. Mashav programs have accumulatively helped train more than 4000 specialized personnel. There have been 1000 Chinese students coming to study in Israel, and nearly 400 Israeli students have learned in China. The content and the variety of our cultural exchanges have been extended, with new energies injected by the participation of commercial and nongovernmental groups in this field. In 2005, our Embassy issued 37000 one-entry or multiple-entry visas for Israelis, which is 2.5 times of the number in 2001. There are 7 pairs of sister cities between China and Israel. And 3 new pairs are on their way.

We can conclude from above-mentioned achievements as the following: Israel has a developed economy and advanced technologies, whereas China has rich human resource, a huge market and limitless potential for development. Our two economies are highly complementary, which is the firmest base and strongest motivation to develop mutually beneficial cooperation at the times of globalization. It is because of discerning such advantages, the top leaders from our two countries both placed high expectations on bilateral cooperation. During his visit to Israel in December 2004, Chinese State Councilor Mr. TANG Jiaxuan proposed that Sino-Israeli trade volume should reach 5 billion dollars by 2008. And just two months ago, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told me once again that China's development is not a threat but Israel's opportunity, and that Israel welcomes Chinese merchandise and continues to promote the export of Israeli hi-tech products to China. This consensus at the top level of the leadership proves that the bilateral relationship is becoming more mature and substantial.

Now I would like to make some recommendations, which may serve as a clue for our future cooperation. Firstly, during "The 11th Five-Year Plan", China will pay most attention on agriculture, work hard to upgrade the science, technology and education, and strive to build a resource conservation and environment friendly society. Since Israel has management expertise and commercialized mechanism in agriculture, information technology, biological technology, new material and new energy, Israel will find promising business opportunities in China in the relative fields. Secondly, there are huge projects related to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games and the 2010 Shanghai World Expo, which will bring unique opportunities for Israeli communication, security, software and electronic companies. Thirdly, the Chinese government is carrying out the strategies of "Grand Development of Western China" and "Strengthening the Central China". Israel has already involved in the construction of central and western China and had a good basis for further cooperation. I believe more and better cooperation can be expected if both sides fully utilize the preferential policies of the Chinese government.

The entrepreneur spirit and business talent of the Jewish people are well acknowledged all over China. I therefore firmly believe that for Israelis, the Chinese market is just like the wide sea for fish to leap or the vast sky for birds to fly. And I am sure we will receive more and more good news of Sino-Israeli cooperation.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

With our economy further developed and upgraded, the international status of China is also strengthened. Chinese are peace-loving people ever since ancient times and the core of Chinese culture is cherishing peace and harmony. Chinese people believe that peace, development and cooperation is the irreversible trend of our times. The Chinese Government unswervingly pursues an independent foreign policy of peace, which focuses on actively pushing for a better world system that is fair and rational, earnestly implementing the new approach to development centered on equality and mutual benefit, promoting the new security concept featuring mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality and cooperation, and advocating a new concept of inter-civilization cooperation that features respect for diversity.

China sincerely hopes that Jewish and Arab nations will coexist peacefully. We oppose terrorism of all forms and support all proposals and mediation efforts helpful for relieving the tense situation in the Middle East. China will continue to make constructive contribution in pushing forward the Middle East peace process.

Thank you!