BEIJING, March 25 -- All countries are welcomed to join the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), China's Vice Finance Minister Shi Yaobin said Wednesday.

"The AIIB is an open and inclusive multilateral development bank. China welcomes all countries to join and make contributions to the infrastructure improvement in Asia," Shi said, responding to a question on whether China communicated with the United States or Japan during the preparation for AIIB.

"However, China will respect their decision whether or when to join," he said.

"China is willing to strengthen communication with them under bilateral or multilateral economic dialogue mechanisms and cooperate with existing multilateral organizations such as the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank."

Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and Switzerland recently applied to join the AIIB, which already has 27 prospective founding members.