B’desh PM Hasina to travel to China next week

Beijing: China on Thursday announced that Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will visit Beijing early next week and meet China’s top leadership, including President Xi Jinping, which will facilitate political mutual trust, and push bilateral relations to a new level.

Hasina’s visit from July 8 to 10, days after her India visit, is being seen as an apparent attempt to balance ties between India and China, one of Dhaka’s biggest investors.

“This is her (Hasina’s) first visit to China since she started her new term. It is also her second visit to China in five years,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told a media briefing here.

During her visit, she will meet President Xi, Premier Li Qiang and attend the signing ceremony of cooperation documents together, Mao said.

The leaders of the two countries will have an “in-depth exchange of views” on deepening traditional friendship, expanding mutually beneficial cooperation and international and regional issues of common concern, the spokesperson said, adding that Hasina will also attend the China-Bangladesh Business Trade and Investment Conference.