Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said at an annual China-EU summit Wednesday afternoon that China will continue to expand market access to foreign countries in accordance with prevailing international economic and trade rules.

Wen jointly held the 10th China-EU Leaders' Meeting with Prime Minister Jose Socrates of Portugal, which currently holds the European Union (EU)'s rotating presidency, and European Commission President Jose Manuel Durao Barroso.

Wen said in one of his four proposals on further developing China-EU relations that the two sides should improve the structure of trade, expand trade volume and properly handle the problems in bilateral trade.

He proposed to maintain close high-level contacts and have prompt exchanges on bilateral and global issues, making full use of the current dialogue mechanism.

He said the two sides should speed up negotiations on a new Partnership and Cooperation Agreement, which was started last January and aimed at replacing the outdated 1985 Trade and Economic Cooperation Agreement.

Wen also proposed to make common working plan on China-EU science-technology cooperation and sign educational exchange and cooperation agreement as soon as possible, implement the working plan on cultural dialogue and cooperation, and strengthen practical cooperation in the fields of climate change, energy and environmental protection.

Wen stressed that the China-EU relationship is now at a new important period of development, and the multi-polarization and globalization have brought more opportunities than challenges for such relationship.

"We are ready to make joint efforts with the EU side to seize the opportunities and raise the level of China-EU comprehensive strategic partnership," said Wen.

The premier said over the past decade the China-EU ties have witnessed the fastest development in history and mutually beneficial cooperation has produced rich results. The ties now have reached an unprecedented level in width and depth, he added.

Wen said the main experience for the relationship's development is that the two sides have attached great importance to it, and treat and develop it from a strategic level and a long-term perspective.

Meanwhile, both China and the EU regard the other's development as an opportunity instead of a threat, establish and improve a set of dialogue and consultation mechanism, and reach consensus on properly solving differences through the equal dialogue and friendly consultation mechanism, he added.

Socrates said the EU-China strategic partnership benefits Europe, China and the world. China is the EU's global trade partner, and the EU appreciates China's active role in solving the nuclear issue of the Korean Peninsula, the Iranian nuclear issue and other major international and regional issues, he added.

Barroso also said the EU hopes to continuously add momentum to the EU-China dialogue mechanism, and solve the issues of common concern by joint efforts.

The two European leaders said the EU adheres to the one-China policy and doesn't support Taiwan's proposed "referendum on UN membership", which they said is an action to change Taiwan's status quo.

(Xinhua News Agency November 29, 2007)