China stands ready to work together with all parties concerned to protect common interests of all countries by safeguarding the free trade and multilateral trading system, a Chinese envoy pledged on Monday.

China’s permanent representative to the UN Ma Zhaoxu made the promises at the High-level Side Event Addressing Unbalanced and Inadequate Development to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on the sidelines of the UN High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development.

The rising tide of unilateralism and trade protectionism recently is threatening global economic growth, causing widespread concern and opposition, Ma warned at the side event co-hosted by the Chinese delegation to the UN together with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA).

As a staunch dissenter of unilateralism and trade and investment protectionism, China believes that trade disputes and frictions should be resolved in a rational manner, the envoy said.

Guided by the innovative, coordinated, green, open and shared development model, China is striving to address the unbalanced and inadequate development, which is also a common challenge facing countries across the world, Ma said, adding that the country is also greatly improving the quality and efficiency of development.

The representative called on all countries to achieve shared prosperity by working together to pursue fair, open, comprehensive and innovative development.

China also contributes its solutions to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development by proposing to co-construct the Belt and Road and actively engaging in international cooperation, the diplomat added.

The establishment of the China-UN peace and development trust fund gives a strong push to realization of the SDGs as well, Ma illustrated.

He stressed that China is willing to, along with all countries, propel international development cooperation, optimize development partnerships, improve the international development environment, and properly cope with the imbalances and inadequacies so as to build a community of common destiny for all mankind.

Other representatives of the meeting hold that discussion on this topic will help all sides realize a beneficial-to-all sustainable development by accelerating the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

They also agreed that the international community should actively build partnerships and take collective actions to jointly meet global challenges on the development road.

Speaking highly of China’s leading role in implementing the 2030 Agenda, they also appreciated the China-UN peace and development trust fund for making important contributions to implementation of the 2030 Agenda by supporting coordinated development of economy, society and environment in developing countries.