The finance ministers from China, Japan and South Korea said in India?Thursday that they agreed to make continuous efforts to seek the possibility to further enhance regional financial cooperation.

They said the three countries have made considerable progress in cooperation and the regional financial cooperation within the ASEAN+3 is going toward a favorable direction.

"Through meaningful and fruitful discussions, we have made considerable progress in the cooperation among the three countries," the ministers said in a joint message after the 6th Trilateral ( China, Japan, South Korea) Finance Ministers' Meeting, on the sidelines of the 39th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors of the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

The message said that the prospects of the three countries' economic growth for 2006 are positive because of the strong demand in the region and continued robust growth of the world economy.

They said they welcomed the completion of the CMI (Chiang Mai Initiative) review, which started in the 2004 ASEAN+3 Finance Ministers' Meeting in Jeju, South Korea.

Officials at the meeting said that during the finance ministers' meeting of the members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and China, Japan and South Korea (ASEAN+3) on Thursday afternoon, they are expected to strike out a plan to further expand the region's financial cooperation on the basis of the CMI, which was borne in May 2000.

"We also agreed to make continuous efforts to seek the possibility to further enhance the regional financial cooperation beyond the CMI, including exploring the ways of achieving multilateralization of the CMI," the ministers said.

The ministers also reaffirmed their strong commitment to promoting other regional cooperation projects such as the Asian Bond Markets Initiative.

Meanwhile, the three ministers said they have noted the importance of sharing a long-term vision for financial integration in the region. They agreed to further study the related issues, including the usefulness of regional currency units, through the ASEAN+3 finance ministers' process.

On the world economic growth, the ministers said there was a need to strengthen the three countries' role in achieving global and regional sustainable growth and financial market stability.

(Xinhua News Agency May 4, 2006)