Xi calls for upgrading China-Tajikistan BRI cooperation
CGTN
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Chinese President Xi Jinping recently called for refining the blueprint for cooperation between China and Tajikistan under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

Xi made the remarks in a signed article published on Tajik media outlets ahead of his state visit to the Central Asian country later this week. He will also attend the fifth summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) in Tajiki capital Dushanbe.

Proposed by Xi in 2013, the BRI comprises the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road, and aims to build trade and infrastructure networks connecting Asia with Europe and Africa along and beyond the ancient Silk Road routes.

"We need to expand our cooperation on the basis of equality and mutual benefit, focus on strategic projects, and give priority to cooperation in energy, transportation, agriculture and industry," he wrote.

Describing China-Tajikistan friendship as "rock solid," Xi stressed that the two countries should deepen coordination in the United Nations, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the CICA.

"We need to jointly uphold multilateralism and the free trade system, oppose unilateralism and bullying tactics, and commit ourselves to improving and updating the global governance system," he added.

(Cover: Dushanbe No. 2 thermal power station in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, October 9, 2018, which was jointly launched by China and Tajikistan and completed in 2016. /Xinhua Photo)