Li Keqiang Meets with President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa of Portugal

On April 29, 2019, Premier Li Keqiang met with President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa of Portugal at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse.

Li Keqiang said that China and Portugal are important cooperative partners and bilateral relations have witnessed sustained and sound development. President Xi Jinping paid a successful state visit to Portugal last year, injecting new impetus into the in-depth development of China-Portugal relations. The Chinese side is ready to strengthening the alignment of the Belt and Road Initiative with Portugal's development strategies, expand all-round cooperation, increase personnel exchanges and continue to consolidate the positive momentum of bilateral relations. China and Portugal are supporters and beneficiaries of open and free trade. We are willing to work with European Union (EU) countries, including the Portuguese side, to jointly uphold multilateralism and free trade, strengthen cooperation under the framework of cooperation between China and the EU and between China and Portuguese-speaking countries, and further intensify communication and coordination the United Nations and other multilateral frameworks to jointly safeguard the world peace, stability and development.

Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa congratulated on the successful holding of the second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation. Portugal-China relations have made substantial progress in the past few years. The Portuguese side supports and actively participates in jointly building the Belt and Road Initiative and is ready to deepen exchanges and cooperation with the Chinese side in economy, trade, people-to-people and cultural engagement and other fields and jointly safeguard free trade to push bilateral relations to a higher level. At the recent EU-China Leaders' Meeting, the two sides reached consensus on developing mutually beneficial and win-win EU-China relations. The Portuguese side is ready to make full use of its advantages as a EU member and a Portuguese-speaking country to promote the development of EU-China relations and relations between Portuguese-speaking countries and China.

Xiao Jie attended the meeting.