China values its all-round friendly relations of cooperation with Malta and is ready to work with the country to further their ties, said Wu Guanzheng on Monday.

Wu, member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and secretary of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the CPC Central Committee, made the remarks in a meeting with Maltese President Edward Fenech Adami.

Wu extended greetings to Adami on behalf of President Hu Jintao and said the China-Malta relations have progressed smoothly since the two countries established diplomatic ties more than 30 years ago.

Recent years have witnessed frequent exchanges of high-level visits between China and Malta and the two countries have made a lot of achievements in their political, economic, trade and cultural cooperation, he said.

Wu said he appreciates Adami's efforts in promoting the Sino-Malta friendly relations of cooperation, as well as Malta's support to China on the Taiwan question.

Adami said China and Malta have a deep traditional friendship and their trade cooperation has been ever closer in recent years. Malta is willing to carry out more cooperative exchanges with China to push the bilateral friendly ties of cooperation to a new height.

He said that he supports China's full market economy status and believed Wu's visit would enhance bilateral ties.

Malta is the first leg of Wu's four-nation goodwill tour in Europe, which will also take him to Sweden, Finland and Belarus before he flies back to Beijing on September 28.

He will leave Malta for Sweden Tuesday morning.

(Xinhua News Agency September 20, 2005)