The third training session of an exchange and research program on international law for China and the Asian-African Legal Consultative Organization (AALCO) kicked off on Monday in Beijing.

In addition to courses on topical subjects and frontier issues in the field of international law, the three-week session will include a conference on the Belt and Road Initiative. 

The session aims to promote international law capacity building of Asian and African countries and discuss China's approach to maintaining world peace and promoting common and shared development.

Fifty participants from 35 AALCO member states, non-AALCO member Laos, the AALCO Secretariat and the African Union Secretariat joined the session. 

Xu Hong, director general of the Department of Treaty and Law of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, and Kennedy Gastorn, secretary general of the AALCO, attended Monday's opening ceremony and delivered opening remarks.

Xu said the Chinese government had been firmly committed to promoting communication and cooperation in the field of international law among Asian and African states. 

Since the world is experiencing profound and complex changes, China has put forward such concepts as fostering a new type of international relations featuring win-win cooperation and comprehensively carrying out the Belt and Road Initiative, he added.

He hoped that the session would become a platform for Asian and African states to exchange views, foster friendship and jointly build a community of shared future for the mankind.

Gastorn highly commended China for its contribution to the promotion of exchange and cooperation in the field of international law among Asian and African states, and reassured that the AALCO would continue to support the Chinese government in the implementation of China-AALCO Exchange and Research Program on International Law, as well as work with China to make further contributions to strengthening solidarity and cooperation among Asian and African states.