From August 5^th to 6^th, China-Turkey Economic, Trade and Cultural Development Forum was held online and offline in Ankara International Convention and Exhibition Center. It was one of the series of activities to celebrate the 50^th anniversary of the establishment of the diplomatic relationship between China and Turkey. Those attended the opening ceremony were Turkey’s vice minister of foreign affairs, Zhang Xu, China’s vice minister of culture and tourism, Turkey’s vice minister of culture and tourism, Liu Shaobin, China’s ambassador to Turkey, and other Chinese and Turkish guests from circles of business, trade, culture and tourism. Recep Tayyip Erdogan, president of Turkey, sent his message of congratulation to the forum.

    Zhang Xu gave a speech through video. He said that since the diplomatic relationship between China and Turkey was established, our bilateral relationship had maintained good development momentum and the practical cooperation in culture and tourism had been promoted steadily. In recent years, both sides had been linking the “Middle Corridor” plan and “Belt and Road” initiative, which provided strong driving force to the strategic cooperation between China and Turkey. He hoped that the opportunities provided by the 50^th anniversary of the establishment of the diplomatic relationship between the two countries, we would start communication in culture and tourism, share development experience, enrich cooperation, innovate cooperation method and create a new situation in the cooperation and development between the two countries, so as to inject new driving forces in our strategic cooperation.

    Turkey’s vice minister of culture and tourism hoped that both sides would enhance people-to-people communication, deepen tourism cooperation, increase the number of people visiting each others’ countries, so as to enable people to support the China-Turkey partnership for strategic cooperation.

    The forum was supported by China’s Embassy in Turkey, Turkey’s Trade Ministry, Turkey’s Agriculture and Forest Ministry, Turkey’s Culture and Tourism Ministry and Turkey’s Foreign Affairs Ministry. It’s jointed organized by the Turkey-China Business Development and Support Association and China Enterprises Chamber of Commerce in Turkey. Guests exchanged ideas on trade, culture, tourism, agriculture, sanitary and so on.