Time-honored Silk Road partnership renewed

Relations between China and Turkey can be traced back to the time of the ancient Silk Road, as records show friendly trading ties between Turkish ancestors and Han people on the Central Plains began to flourish more than 1,000 years ago.

President Xi Jinping holds a welcoming ceremony for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan outside the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Tuesday. [Photo/China Daily]

Today, both countries are emerging markets and important players in the regional and world arenas. Beijing and Ankara obviously have everything to gain from continuously building on their time-honored friendship. Hence, it is good to see the two countries have seized the opportunity of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's visit to China this week to further consolidate their strategic partnership.

President Xi Jinping's meeting with Erdogan on Tuesday has sent an unmistakable message to the outside world that Beijing and Ankara are committed to building more strategic mutual trust and deepening bilateral cooperation so as to keep bilateral ties on a healthy and stable track.

Indeed, a more cordial atmosphere for cooperation between China and Turkey, which are located on the eastern and western ends of the Asian continent respectively, will not only bring more benefits to themselves but also contribute to regional and world peace and development.

Thanks to the efforts of both sides in recent years, China has become the third-biggest trading partner of Turkey as well as its second-largest source of imports. Now, with their mutual pledge to push for synergy between the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative and Turkey's Middle Corridor project, there is great potential to expand bilateral cooperation into such fields as trade, investment, science and technology, energy and infrastructure.

Admittedly, not everything is rosy in China-Turkey bilateral ties as Ankara has from time to time vented its spleen on China's anti-terrorism efforts in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region in recent years. But judging by Erdogan's remarks in Beijing, the two countries are now ready to turn over a new leaf.

In his meeting with Xi, Erdogan said that it is hard fact that residents of various ethnicities live happily together in Xinjiang thanks to China's prosperity, and Turkey will not allow anyone to drive a wedge between itself and China.

This welcoming stance shows China's deradicalization efforts in Xinjiang are gaining more recognition and understanding in the world as an important contribution to the global anti-terrorism cause, including Ankara's own efforts to build a peaceful peripheral environment.

With bilateral ties steering clear of obstacles and gathering more momentum, we have reasons to believe the road of reciprocal cooperation between China and Turkey will be even brighter in the future.

There is certainly a stronger mutual need for better coordinating their stances in the world arena so as to better defend their interests as well as those of developing countries and uphold mutual respect and win-win cooperation in international relations.