Chinese President Xi Jinping on Sunday appreciated his Czech counterpart Milos Zeman for standing up and speaking for China, including calls for fair and equitable treatment of Chinese telecom companies.

Xi made the remarks during his meeting with President Zeman, who is in Beijing and attended the second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation, which closed in the Chinese capital on Saturday.

Since the establishment of diplomatic ties between Czech Republic and China 70 years ago, friendly cooperation has always been the mainstream of bilateral relations, President Xi noted.

He added China is willing to work with Czech Republic to seize the historic opportunity of jointly building the Belt and Road to promote bilateral strategic partnership to a new level. 

China will unswervingly deepen reform and open wider and advocate win-win cooperation, Xi added.

The two sides should maintain contacts at all levels in more fields, he said, adding that China hopes Czech Republic will play a constructive role in enhancing the development of China-EU ties.

Zeman said that he attaches great importance to developing relations with China.

Czech Republic is willing to actively take part in the Belt and Road construction, enhance bilateral cooperation in trade and investment, and enhance people-to-people exchanges, he added.

The Czech president also expressed his support for deeper EU-China ties.

After the meeting, the two presidents witnessed the signing of some bilateral cooperation documents.