BEIJING, Sept. 2 (Xinhua) -- As African leaders are gathering in Beijing for a summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), expectations run high for the two sides to strengthen their already solid friendship and further enhance pragmatic cooperation to bring tangible benefits to the Chinese and African people.
China’s reform and opening up has brought three major opportunities for Africa’s development. First of all, China’s industrial upgrading provides an opportunity for Africa’s industrialization.
China and Angola established diplomatic ties in 1983. Nineteen years later, Angola’s civil war was formally brought to an end, and the country was in urgent need of reconstruction.
The Belt and Road Initiative proposed by Chinese President Xi Jinping has provided new grounds for the cooperation between China and Africa, whose destinies are bound together by similar historical sufferings, common development tasks and shared strategic interests. After Xi put forward the building of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road respectively in Kazakhstan and Indonesia in the autumn of 2013, the proposal has been echoed by many countries including those in Africa, who bear a hope of grasping opportunity to pursue common development with China and the whole world.
