Chinese Premier Li Keqiang will on Friday embark on a busy five-day trip to Uzbekistan and Thailand for multilateral meetings and official visits, a key diplomatic move of China to build stronger ties and forge ahead with its neighbors for long-term stability and common development, Eurasia Diary reports citing Xinhua.
Besides visits to Tashkent and Bangkok, Li is scheduled to attend the 18th meeting of the Council of Heads of Government of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), as well as the 22nd China-ASEAN (10+1) leaders' meeting, the 22nd ASEAN-China, Japan and South Korea (10+3) leaders' meeting, and the 14th East Asia Summit (EAS).
The trip is widely seen as a fresh effort to better align China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) with other national and regional development plans to enhance cooperation and work with its partners to defend multilateralism and promote free trade.
As neighborhood diplomacy serves as a key pillar of China's foreign policy, Li's trip will further cement political trust and grow ties between China and its neighbors, so as to build a closer and mutually beneficial community with shared prosperity.