Lima, Sept. 19, 2006.- The Acting Secretary General of the Andean Community, Alfredo Fuentes, and the Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China agreed last night to express their interest in deepening CAN-Chinese relations and in boosting the “Agreement to Establish a Political Consultation and Cooperation Mechanism."

The Agreement, signed in March 2000, has made it possible to build a favorable vehicle for bilateral relations through meetings of the Consultation Mechanism held on October 21, 2002 in Bogotá and on September 6, 2004 in Beijing.

At a working meeting held last night due to the visit by the Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs to the headquarters of the Andean organization in Lima, the CAN Secretary General, Alfredo Fuentes, proposed convening the Third Meeting of the Mechanism in the first quarter of next year, preferably in Bolivia because that country will be occupying the CAN’s Presidency Pro Tempore until July 2007.

Fuentes stated that the points that could be addressed during the Meeting could be, among others, common stands in international forums, China’s support for the incorporation of Colombia and Ecuador as Members of APEC in 2008, and the search for investment promotion mechanisms envisaged in the agenda for the dialogue with China approved by the Andean Council of Foreign Ministers in October 2005.

He also proposed including the subjects of agricultural health, information technologies, tourism and education on the bilateral agenda and holding meetings at different levels between the General Secretariat and the Chinese Embassy in Lima to follow up on the agenda.

Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs, Yang Jiechi, for his part, pointed up the “substantial advances” made in bilateral cooperation between the CAN and China in recent years following the activating of the consultation mechanism and the holding of two rounds of consultation on the execution of telecommunications, energy, infrastructure, training and human resource projects.

He expressed his willingness to make all necessary efforts to perfect the consultation mechanism so that it will perform more efficiently for purposes of South-South Cooperation and, in this connection, considered it important to convene the mechanism’s third round for the first quarter of next year.

He considered the agenda proposed by the CAN, and particularly the proposal for promoting investments, to be “very constructive.” “Our attitude toward investing in the Andean region is highly positive,” he stressed," and went on to express his desire that the Andean countries offer the necessary facilities for those investments.