Visiting Mongolian President Nambaryn Enkhbayar said in Beijing Wednesday Mongolia is ready to expand cooperation with China in various fields, including the economy, infrastructure, energy and culture.

Enkhbayar told a news briefing at the Mongolian embassy in Beijing that he and his Chinese host had a "frank and open exchange of views" on bilateral relations and discussed future cooperation on infrastructure projects like roads, railways, mining and a highway network linking Mongolia, China and Russia.

The two nations agreed to boost cultural exchange and cooperation in the spheres of education, tourism and environment, and also signed agreements on cooperation in the railway and energy sectors, he said.

Mongolian Foreign Minister Tsendiin Munkh-Orgil told the briefing that the governments of Mongolia and China will work together to explore certain large coal deposits in Mongolia.

"This is a rather long-term project, but it's important to have the political understanding and to have the commitment to work in that direction," he said.

China was Enkhbayar's first foreign visit since he was elected president in July. "It is not by accident that I have chosen the People's Republic of China (PRC) for my first visit," Enkhbayar told reporters.

"It is rather a reflection of the priority that Mongolia attaches to the development of bilateral relations with the PRC," he said.

Besides Beijing, Enkhbayar visited on Tuesday the port city of Tianjin, which he said "serves as Mongolia's main gateway to Asia and the Pacific," and will also visit the booming east China cities of Hangzhou and Shanghai.

"There (in Hangzhou) I plan to visit a high tech park to see if Mongolia can adopt a similar concept to attract foreign investment," said Enkhbayar.

As a landlocked country, Mongolia has trouble in getting direct foreign investment, he said.

"In fact, we exceeded the (accumulated) level of US$1 billion of investment only in autumn of 2003 after 15 years of hard work as a democratic country and market economy," he said.

After the news briefing, he attended an opening ceremony of Mongolian Tourism Information Center held at the embassy.

Early on Wednesday, Enkhbayar delivered a speech entitled "Globalization and Small Countries" at Beijing University.

(Xinhua News Agency December 1, 2005)