In Beijing on Wednesday Chinese Vice-President Zeng Qinghong met with Mohammed Saeid Bekheitan, assistant secretary of Regional Leadership of the Syrian Baath Arab Socialist Party.

 

Bekheitan, a guest of the Communist Party of China (CPC), is visiting China from September 10-15. He's also president of the Syria-China friendship association.

 

Highlighting sound cooperation between China and Syria since the two countries established diplomatic ties 50 years ago, Zeng said joint efforts would be made to better bilateral relations. He's also a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee.

 

Zeng expressed his appreciation of Syria's consistent support for China on Taiwan and human rights issues and hoped the CPC and the Syrian ruling party, which forged party relations in 1986, could deepen their exchanges to facilitate nation-to-nation relations.

 

Bekheitan expressed his appreciation for the role China had played in maintaining peace and justice in the world saying the Syrian government would remain with the one-China policy and work with the Chinese to further cooperation in such fields as trade and culture.

 

In an exclusive interview on Wednesday he also expressed regret and concern over the Chinese diplomat injured in Syria and said he hoped the official would recover soon. "I've no detailed information about the incident but the Chinese embassy is located very close to the US embassy," he said.

 

Bekheitan added that he'd contacted officials in Syria on Tuesday about the injured diplomat and his condition was said to be satisfactory.

 

(Xinhua News Agency September 14, 2006)