Premier Rides High-tech Train on VisitPremier Zhu Rongji wrapped up a four-day trade tour to Germany Sunday with visits to several high-tech projects.He is to leave Germany, the second leg of his six-nation Europe trip, this morning and head for Luxembourg. He will later travel to the Netherlands, Italy and Belgium. Zhu, on his first official visit to Germany as head of the Chinese Government, was very interested in high-tech projects. The Chinese premier visited a testing and development centre of the Transrapid magnetic train in Lathen yesterday afternoon. He then took a ride on the test train, which has a top speed of 450 kilometres per hour, along a 31.5-kilometre-long test track. Germany hopes to sell the magnetic monorail technology to China for use on a proposed high-speed rail line from Beijing to Shanghai. On Friday, China and Germany signed a contract to conduct a feasibility study on the construction of a magnetic high-speed rail link between Shanghai's Lujiazui and its new international airport in Pudong. Analysts said the project, if it is approved would result in billions of dollars worth of contracts. Zhu said he hoped the construction of the magnetic high-speed rail in Shanghai could be completed as soon as possible. By the end of last year, Germany had launched 2,125 direct investment projects in China, mostly in machinery, cars,electronics, communications, energy, medicine, chemicals and environmental protection. On Saturday, Zhu also visited Norddeutsche Affinerie Group, one of the world's biggest copper suppliers in Hamburg. While touring in the factories, Zhu asked questions about the company's environmental protection technology. Zhu also visited the Chinese and the German pavilions at the Expo 2000 in Hannover, a northern German city. The Chinese pavilion shows China's information technologies, aerospace and aviation research, bio-engineering and traditional Chinese medicine . |
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