习近平主席结束欧洲之行
Chinese president Xi Jinping has returned to Beijing from his four-nation Europe tour, which took him to the Netherlands, France, Germany and Belgium. During his visit to Belgium, he delivered a speech outlining his vision of the fast growing relationship between the European union and China.
Escorted to the podium by Belgium's royal family and his wife Peng Liyuan and surrounded by EU officials China's President Xi Jinping spent the final day of his European tour speaking at Belgium's College of Europe that has turned out many of the continent's leaders and senior ministers.
Xi laid out his vision of where Europe and China should be heading in the coming years. He said, "China and the EU are two of the most important major economies in the world with a combined economy accounting for one third of the global economy. We must uphold an open market, speed up negotiations on the investment agreement, actively explore the possibility of a free trade area and strive to achieve the ambitious goal of bringing two-way trade to one trillion U.S. dollars by 2020."
After the speech, Xi met with workers at car manufacturer Volvo, which was acquired by China's auto giant Geely in 2010.
It capped the end of Xi's four-nation tour in which he met with heads of state, including Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande.
With the French, President Xi oversaw the signing of fifty deals worth 25 billion U.S. dollars, including an order for seventy Airbus planes.
In Germany, there were also multi-billion dollar agreements, including one to expand automaker Daimler's presence in China.
Earlier in the week, Xi became the first Chinese president to visit the EU headquarters where he secured a groundbreaking agreement to begin negotiations on a free trade deal between the EU and China.
Ultimately, though, it was a visit that will be remembered perhaps not for the multi-billion dollar deals or even Europe's pledge of negotiations on a free trade agreement, but for bringing China and Europe to a whole new level in terms of closer diplomatic relations.
