Visiting Vice Premier Wu Yi and Singaporean Deputy Prime Minister Wong Kan Seng in Singapore Tuesday cochaired the second meeting of China-Singapore Joint Council for Bilateral Cooperation (JCBC).

Satisfied with the progress made by the JCBC over the past year, the two leaders said that the Council, as an important mechanism, has played an active role in promoting friendship and cooperation between China and Singapore.

They agreed to further perfect and strengthen the JCBC mechanism to enhance bilateral collaboration in various fields on the mutually beneficial basis.

During the meeting, Wu suggested four areas in which the two countries may deepen cooperation, which include high-tech and infocomm technology, development of the West and the Northeast China, the internationalization of Chinese enterprises, as well as personnel exchange and training.

Responding actively to Wu's proposals, Wong said the Singapore government has been attaching great importance to its friendly and cooperative relationship with China and is willing to make bilateral relations closer, extend fields of cooperation and share common development with China in the context of globalization.

He stressed that a developed and prosperous China will make active contributions to regional stability.

Wong added that Singapore is looking forward to working with China in pushing forward the relations between the Association of Southeast Asian nations (ASEAN) and China during the East Asia Summit to be held in Malaysia at the end of this year.

In conjunction with the meeting, the China-Singapore Economic and Trade Cooperation Website was officially launched by the two leaders.

This one-stop portal will serve the business community in the two countries by providing them with information on fields like trade, investment, market, economic technological cooperation and product.

After the meeting, the two leaders also witnessed the signing of five cooperation agreements and memorandum of understandings (MOUs) involving human resource, quality supervision, business and investment.

Singapore is China's largest economic and trade partner in ASEAN and their bilateral trade volume have been increasing in recent years, expected to reach US$50 billion in 2010.

Wu arrived in Singapore Monday afternoon for a three-day official visit at Wong's invitation.

Singapore is the first stop of Wu's three-state trip, which will also take her to Thailand and Brunei.

(Xinhua News Agency September 20, 2005)