Moroccan King Mohamed VI met in Marakach on Monday with visiting top Chinese legislator Wu Bangguo. Wu, chairman of the Standing Committee of the Chinese National People's Congress (NPC), was on a three-day official goodwill visit to Morocco, the first by an NPC head since the two countries established diplomatic relations 47 years ago.

The king praised the development of Morocco-China relations, saying the long-standing, good cooperative ties can well be hailed as a model of state-to-state relations.

He said Wu's visit will definitely further advance the further development of bilateral ties in political, economic, trade and other areas.

For his part, Wu hailed the development of bilateral ties, saying former Chinese President Jiang Zemin's visit to Morocco in 1999 and the king's 2002 trip to China have opened a new chapter in Sino-Moroccan friendly relations and laid a solid foundation for the development of bilateral ties in the new century.??

He said China's new central collective leadership attaches great importance to developing friendly relations with Morocco and stands ready to work with the Moroccan side to further strengthen exchanges, boost people-to-people friendship, deepen mutually beneficial cooperation so as to benefit the people of the two countries.??

Wu also briefed the king on the China-Africa Cooperation Forum and the Chinese-Arab Cooperation Forum, and the king said Morocco will take an active part in the two forums.

King Mohamed VI said that leaders of many African countries highly value China's Africa policy, and hope China will play an even greater role in Africa and the Middle East.

Sheng Huaren, vice chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, was also present at the meeting.
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(Xinhua News Agency September 6, 2005)