China and France on Wednesday held a economic seminar in Beijing to explore new ways of cooperation between the two business communities.

Chen Zhili, vice chairwoman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's legislature, told participants it was in the interests of the peoples and enterprises of China and France to continue development of economic and trade cooperation.

Chen said that eliminating all disturbances and maintaining sound political relations and mutual trust were essential to promote pragmatic cooperation.

"We hope that people from business, economic and trade circles of the two countries can work together to create favourable conditions for the healthy development of the bilateral ties," she said.

Chen outlined measures taken by the Chinese government to offset the effects of the financial crisis, saying the stable and relatively rapid growth of China's economy was an important contribution to the world economy. "China, as a responsible country, will, as always, work with the international community to tackle the difficulties."

Former French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin said there was great promise for further cooperation between the two countries.

He said enterprises of both countries should take the opportunity to enhance investment cooperation, promote the balance of trade and provide legal, financial and technological guarantees to cement the enterprise-to-enterprise cooperation.

During the two-day seminar, Chinese and French scholars and entrepreneurs will explore new ways of cooperation between the two business communities, discuss the sustainable development of energy and environment as well as city planning and set forth suggestions on how financial institutions should deal with the financial crisis.

China and France issued a press communique on April 1, just hours before the presidents Hu Jintao and Nicolas Sarkozy met in London ahead of a Group of 20 summit on the global financial crisis.

The communique said the two sides "attach great importance to China-France relations" and reiterated their adherence to the principle of non-interference in each other's internal affairs.

In the communique, France pledged not to support "Tibet independence" in any form.

Relations between China and France deteriorated in December last year when Sarkozy met with the Dalai Lama in Poland.

(Xinhua News Agency April 8, 2009)