The Chinese government will, as always, support non-governmental efforts to promote mutual understanding between its people and the peoples of other nations, enhance cooperation of mutual benefit, and safeguard the common interests of the people of the world, Chinese President Hu Jintao has said.

Hu made the remarks in a meeting held here Thursday to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (CPAFFC).

"The Chinese government has all along attached importance to non-governmental diplomacy, which holds an important position in the overall diplomacy of the country," he said.

Hu said that non-governmental diplomacy plays an increasingly important role in today's world, and is conducive to promoting friendship and cultural and economic cooperation and has laid the foundation for the development of state-to-state relations.

Hu spoke highly of the contribution of the CPAFFC to promoting exchanges between China and other countries. He said that over the past 50 years, the CPAFFC has done a lot in promoting friendship between the Chinese people and the peoples of other nations and helped create a favorable international environment for China's development.

The fifty-year development of the CPAFFC demonstrates that the CPAFFC has become a driving force to push forward China's non-governmental diplomacy cause, he said.

The advantages of non-governmental diplomacy should be taken to serve economic construction and help introduce China to the outside world so as to promote cooperation of mutual benefit with other countries, he said, adding that cultural exchanges should also be encouraged through non-governmental diplomacy.

Chen Haosu, president of the CPAFFC, delivered a speech, recalling the work of the CPAFFC over the past 50 years. Former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari and former Australian Prime Minister Robert James Lee Hawke addressed the meeting.

Over 700 representatives who are devoted to non-governmental diplomacy participated in the meeting.

(Xinhua News Agency May 21, 2004)