China offers to facilitate dialog resumption between Israel, Palestine
Beijing, Apr 7 (EFE).- China is willing to facilitate the resumption of peace negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians and applauds the normalization of Israel’s relations with other countries in the region, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his Israeli counterpart Yair Lapid.
The foreign ministers spoke by phone Wednesday night and discussed both the protracted conflict and crisis in Ukraine and the Iranian nuclear issue, Chinese state media reported Thursday.
The prolonged stagnation of the Palestinian-Israeli peace process goes against the general interest, said the head of Chinese diplomacy, who added that “Palestine also has the legitimate right to establish an independent state,” state agency Xinhua reported.
“China supports all efforts to achieve peace in the Middle East and is ready to facilitate direct negotiations between the two sides on the basis of the two-state solution,” Wang added.
He also said his country is glad Israel has established and developed normal and friendly relations with countries around it, “something that should be part of the general reconciliation” in the Middle East.
According to the agency, Lapid said Israel “is committed to improving relations with Palestine.”
On Ukraine, the agency said only that Wang told the Israeli foreign minister the Chinese position in defense of dialogue and peace negotiations.
Beijing has maintained an ambiguous position since the beginning of the conflict: it has called for the territorial integrity of all countries to be respected but has avoided using the word “invasion” to refer to the Russian offensive, while reiterating its opposition to sanctions against Moscow.
Both ministers agreed to accelerate the negotiation and signing of a free trade agreement to “send positive signals to the global economy on its hard path to recovery.”
They also agreed to deepen high-level exchanges and cooperation in various fields.
China is Israel’s second largest trading partner, with an exchange that was close to 12,000 million dollars in 2020 and millionaire injections in the high technology, biomedicine, infrastructure and telecommunications sectors. EFE
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