Top legislator Wu Bangguo on Monday held talks in Montevideo with Uruguay's National Congress President Rodolfo Gustavo Nin Novoa on promotion of bilateral ties.

 

Novoa, who is also vice president of Uruguay and president of Senate, said Uruguay highly valued its relations with China and that he believed Wu's visit would further boost the development of Uruguay-China ties and parliamentary exchanges.

 

Wu, chairman of the Standing Committee of China's National People's Congress (NPC), said that parliamentary exchanges play an irreplaceable role in promoting mutual understanding between the peoples, as well as enhancing friendly exchanges between the political parties and increasing pragmatic cooperation in economy and trade, and other fields.

 

He said China's NPC hoped to maintain high-level contacts with Uruguay's National Congress to exchange views on key issues of common concern.

 

Wu also expressed his hope that the two legislative bodies would improve coordination and cooperation in international and regional parliamentary organizations to promote the democratization of international relations and jointly safeguard the interests of developing countries.

 

For his part, Novoa said he fully agreed with Wu on the importance of parliamentary exchanges, saying Uruguay's National Congress was willing to strengthen friendly exchanges with China's NPC, promote mutual understanding between the two sides, and push forward cooperation in economy and trade to boost the comprehensive development of bilateral ties.

 

The two leaders also discussed international affairs. They agreed that international relations should be democratized and the diversity of civilizations in the world should be respected. They also expressed their support for multi-polarization and opposition to hegemonism and power politics in any forms.

 

They also stressed equality among countries, saying that all the countries in the world, no matter big or small, powerful or weak, rich or poor, are equal members of the international community.

 

They agreed that every country has its right to choose its social system and path of development based on its own situations, and that a country's internal affairs should be handled by its own people while international affairs should be solved through negotiations based on equal footing.

 

The two also urged the international community to listen more to the voices of developing countries and take measures to protect their legitimate rights to push the world economy to develop in a balanced, stable and mutual-beneficial way.

 

After talks, Wu and Novoa attended a signing ceremony of 10 bilateral agreements on cooperation in economy and trade.

 

Wu arrived here on Sunday from Brazil and was expected to leave Uruguay for Chile on Tuesday, the last leg of his three-nation South American tour.

 

(Xinhua News Agency September 5, 2006)