Minister Zhong Shan speaks with WTO Director-General Azevedo
On the afternoon of August 13, Zhong Shan, Minister of Commerce, had a phone call in Beijing with the outgoing WTO Director-General Azevedo, and exchanged views on issues such as maintaining the multilateral trading system and strengthening cooperation between China and the WTO.
Zhong Shan stated that since taking office in September 2013, Director-General Azevedo has promoted members to jointly reach the "Trade Facilitation Agreement" and end the "Information Technology Agreement" expansion negotiations, in order to maintain the multilateral trading system and promote global trade liberalization. Facilitation has made a positive contribution, and China affirms and appreciates this.
Azevedo thanked China for its firm support and maintenance of the multilateral trading system with the WTO at its core, its active participation in various WTO negotiations, and its full support for the work of the secretariat led by the Director-General.
Zhong Shan said that the general trend of economic globalization and multilateralism is irreversible. China will, as always, firmly support economic globalization and the multilateral trading system, oppose unilateralism and protectionism, and promote the construction of an open world economy.