CJFA President Song Jian Attends NortheastAsia Economic Conference

Invited by the Japanese Niigata Prefectural Government and the Japan Economic Research Institute for Northeast Asia, Song Jian, president of the China-Japan Friendship Association (CJFA), attended the Northeast Asia Economic Conference in Niigata and visited Tokyo and Akita Prefecture from January 31 to February 7, 2004.

On February 2, the 14th Northeast Asia Economic Conference jointly sponsored by Niigata Prefecture, Niigata City and the Japan Economic Research Institute for Northeast Asia and assisted by the United Nations was opened at the Toki Convention Centre. More than 550 participants from Japan, China, Russia, the Republic of Korea (ROK), Mongolia and the United States attended the Conference. At the plenary meeting Song Jian made a key-note speech entitled Cooperate with the Neighbouring Countries and Strive for a Common Development. In the speech Song Jian spoke about China’s present situation, its future prospects and the opening up and good-neighbour policy in the 21st century. By giving sufficient and accurate data and in the spirit of increasing trust and removing misgivings, Song Jian refuted the arguments inconsistent with the facts appearing in connection with China’s recent development such as “China threat”; “China is a global factory” that has squeezed other countries out; China is a “black hole” sucking international capitals, etc., and expounded the independent foreign policy of peace and the policy of building a good-neighbourly relationship and partnership with neighbouring countries that China has always pursued. He expressed the aspiration that China will, as always, develop relations of equality and mutual benefit with all countries in the world including the neighbouring countries. In the speech, Song Jian also gave a detailed briefing about the strategy of revitalizing China’s Northeast old industrial base that China is going to implement, and hoped that the governments and businessmen that attended the conference would actively participate in China’s endeavour so that the revitalization of China’s Northeast would integrate with the development of Northeast Asia and play a role in rejuvenating the regional economy. Song’s speech was highly appraised by the participants of the conference. They unanimously held that based on the strategy and keeping the future in mind the speech with full and accurate data and in simple and unadorned language was very convincing by giving facts and good reasoning. President Song Jian is one of the initiators who have conceived the idea of developing the Northeast Asia’s economy, and has made positive contributions to promoting the concrete implementation of the idea over the past more than ten years. The participants held that many practical suggestions on the future implementation of the idea put forward by Song Jian in his speech were very important, pointing out direction for the future work.