China-ASEAN ties to open new chapter of common prosperity: scholar

The China-ASEAN relations will open a new chapter of common prosperity if the two sides continue to boost cooperation in wide areas, said Yang Baoyun, a professor specializing in ASEAN studies at Thailand's Thammasat University.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the establishment of dialogue relations between China and ASEAN. Thirty years on, bilateral relations have forged ahead on the basis of mutual respect, mutual trust and mutual benefit, with bilateral cooperation continuing to deepen and the scope further expanding, Yang said in a recent interview with Xinhua.

Yang spoke highly of the fruitful cooperation progress that China and ASEAN have achieved in sectors such as political security, economy and trade as well as people-to-people and cultural exchanges.

Calling the two sides' anti-pandemic cooperation "a paradigm," Yang said China and ASEAN have supported each other in time of difficulty and fought against the pandemic in concerted efforts.

ASEAN countries donated medical supplies to support China at the height of its fight against COVID-19, and China returned the favor by offering medical supplies, dispatching medical teams, sharing prevention and treatment experiences and donating or providing vaccines to assist ASEAN member countries' anti-pandemic work.

While the pandemic hammered trade around the world, China and ASEAN have managed to buck the downward trend with an annual 7-percent trade growth in 2020. ASEAN for the first time became China's largest trading partner last year and has secured the position into this year, Yang said.

The China-ASEAN relations, though weighed by some uncertainties, have remained stable.

"They will sure open a new chapter of common prosperity if the two sides continue to boost cooperation in wide areas, with cooperation in the field of political security as the foundation, economic cooperation as the impetus while people-to-people and cultural exchanges as the bridge," he said.