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Chinese Ambassador Hail China-Ethiopia Relations
Chinese Ambassador to Ethiopia Ai Ping has said that Sino-Ethiopia bilateral cooperation have been increasing steadily following Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's visit to China in 1995 and President Jiang Zemin's visit to Ethiopia in 1996.
The Chinese ambassador made the remarks in a recent interview with local media, saying that trade relations between the two countries have been increasing significantly over the past two years while the volume of trade exchange between the two sides currently stands at nearly 58 million U.S. dollars.
Chinese economic cooperation projects in Ethiopia mainly focused on infrastructure development, vocational training, hydroelectric power generation and enterprise management.
The Chinese government has provided about a 12-million-dollar interest-free loan in support of the construction of the ring road project in the capital of Addis Ababa and constructed low-cost houses in the metropolis.
Ai Ping noted that China has supplied an interest-free loan of nearly 2.4 million dollars and 1 million dollars to a textile factory in Awassa, capital of the Southern National Nationalities Peoples' state, in support of its production expansion program.
Besides, he added that relevant ministries from the two countries are conducting intensive consultations aimed at relieving Ethiopia's debt liabilities to China.
In a related development, a Chinese trade delegation headed by Zhou Keren, Vice Minister of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation is currently in Addis Ababa for a three- day working visit to Ethiopia.
During the visit, the Chinese delegation held talks with Ethiopian government officials and discussed the issues of the relief of Ethiopian debt owed to China and the further cooperation between the two countries.
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