On the morning of June 3, Yin Li, Secretary of the CPC Beijing Municipal Committee, met with Yohei Kono, President of the Japanese Association for the Promotion of International Trade (JAPIT), who led a delegation to Beijing.

Yin Lin provided an overview of Beijing’s socio-economic development and the planning and construction of the Beijing Municipal Administrative Center (BMC). He emphasized that friendly and mutually beneficial cooperation between China and Japan is not only vital to the development of both countries but also to global prosperity and stability. At the end of last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba held a meeting in Lima, where they agreed to comprehensively advance the strategic relationship of mutual benefit between China and Japan and build a constructive and stable relationship that meets the requirements of the new era. They charted the future course for Sino-Japan relationship. Yin highlighted the longstanding foundation of cooperation between Beijing and Japan. As Beijing’s first international sister city, Tokyo has maintained broad and in-depth exchanges with the Chinese capital. Beijing is currently striving to develop new quality productive forces to promote high-quality economic growth. The city stands ready to expand economic and trade cooperation with Japan, align with high-standard international rules such as RCEP, and further facilitate cross-border trade. He called for stronger cooperation and mutual learning in areas related to people’s livelihoods, particularly in addressing population aging. Yin also encouraged more investment and cooperation in key sectors such as artificial intelligence, digital economy, new energy vehicles, hydrogen energy, and medicine and health. It is important to jointly develop the Beijing China-Japan Innovation & Cooperation Demonstration Zone and enhance industry-academia partnerships for applied research between the two regions. In addition, Yin advocated for closer exchanges in culture, sports, tourism, and youth engagement to foster mutual understanding and trust between the two peoples.

Yohei Kono noted that Japan and China are important neighbors with a long history of close economic and trade ties. JAPIT is ready to leverage its role to further advance economic and trade cooperation, as well as cultural and people-to-people exchanges between the two countries, thereby continuously strengthening the friendship between the Japanese and Chinese peoples.

Kanasugi Kenji, Japanese Ambassador to China, as well as Beijing municipal leaders Xia Linmao and Zhao Lei, attended the meeting.