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Premier Li Keqiang's Visit to Croatia Creates 10 "Firsts"
2019-05-21 20:06

From April 9 to 12, in less than 72 hours, Premier Li Keqiang visited Croatia and attended the 8th Summit of China and Central and Eastern European Countries (16+1) , setting off a strong "China fever" in Croatia. Croatian media's comprehensive and in-depth coverage of the visit and the summit is as strong as the Croatian national football team winning the 2nd place in the World Cup last July. The media noticed that the visit and the summit have created 10 "firsts", and greatly promoted China-Croatia relations and "16+1 cooperation":

1. Chinese Premier's first visit to Croatia. Premier Li Keqiang's visit is the first visit to Croatia by the Premier of the State Council of China during the past 27 years since the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Croatia. He is also the highest level leader in China that visited Croatia in almost a decade.

2. The number of agreements that were signed and issued by the two countries set a record. During the visit and the summit, the number of cooperation agreements that were officially issued or signed by the two countries reached 10, setting a record in both the number and the variety of fields.

3. "16+1 cooperation" achieved the first membership enlargement. The leaders of China and Central and Eastern European countries unanimously accepted Greece as a full member of the "16+1 Cooperation", thus "16+1 Cooperation" has upgraded to "17+1 Cooperation" after seven years.

4. First time for Chinese Premier and Croatian Prime Minister to attend the opening ceremony of the Year of Culture and Tourism. This year is the China-Croatia Year of Culture and Tourism, which is the first time that China hosts Year of Culture and Tourism with any country in Central and Eastern Europe. It is also the first time that the Chinese Premier and his counterpart attended the opening ceremony of such events.

5. The number of attendees at the 16+1 Business Forum exceeded 1,000 for the first time. The number of people attending the 9th China-Central and Eastern European Countries Business Forum reached more than 1,000. The scale was unprecedented, and the number of reached cooperation intentions and signings of formal contracts reached a record high.

6. The length of time spent attending a single bilateral event set a record. Premier Li Keqiang and Prime Minister Andrej Plenković inspected the largest cooperation project between the two countries, the Pelješac Bridge project, together, by taking a catamaran and motorcade for nearly five hours for round-trip, setting a record for the longest time for the Premier to visit a single event, fully reflecting that two governments attach great importance to this project.

7. The first large-scale exhibition of 16+1 education cooperation was held. Premier Li Keqiang and the leaders of the 16 Central and Eastern European countries jointly visited the first large-scale 16+1 education cooperation exhibition, bringing the education cooperation between the two sides to a new height.

8. The first EU member to sign a cooperation agreement with HUAWEI. Premier Li Keqiang witnessed the signing of two cooperation agreements between the Central State Office for the Development of Digital Society of Croatia and HUAWEI company. This is the first time that an EU member state has publicly signed a cooperation agreement with Huawei recently.

9. The first consulting institution of "16+1 Cooperation" is officially established. Premier Li Keqiang and the Bulgarian and Croatian Prime Ministers jointly unveiled the "16+1 Global Partnership Center", promoting the "16+1 Cooperation" to a more professional level.

10. The Croatian side set a number of "firsts" on the reception standards for the Chinese delegation. For the first time Prime Minister Plenković together with his wife welcomed the delegation at the airport; for the first time the national "Big Three" (President, Prime Minister, Speaker of the Parliament) attended the welcoming banquet for the delegation; the scale of police force deployed for the visit and the summit, as well as the standard of security protection, also set a record high in history.

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