ANKARA — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on March 25 met with visiting Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, pledging to build closer ties with China and deepen bilateral cooperation.

Congratulating the Communist Party of China (CPC) on the 100th anniversary of its founding, Erdogan said the Justice and Development Party, the ruling party of Turkey, looks forward to enhancing its communication with the CPC and contributing to the cooperation among the political parties around the world.

Turkey attaches great importance to developing its relations with China, the Turkish leader said, stressing that his country is firmly against any form of terrorism and hopes to build closer ties with China.

By publicly getting the jab of China-developed COVID-19 vaccine, he has shown to Turkish citizens as well as the whole world the safety and effectiveness of the Chinese vaccine, said Erdogan, adding that Turkey wants to deepen its vaccine cooperation with China and explore the potential of conducting such cooperation with a third party.

Turkey looks forward to increasing Turkey-China high-level exchanges, boosting mutual trust, promoting the synergy between China's Belt and Road Initiative and Turkey's "Middle Corridor" plan, enhancing cooperation in the fields including interconnection and intercommunication, infrastructure construction and investment, seeking more balanced development of bilateral trade, and encouraging local currency settlement, said the Turkish president.

He added that Turkey values China's five-point initiative for achieving the security and stability in the Middle East and is willing to deepen communication and coordination with China on regional affairs.

Wang conveyed the greetings from Chinese President Xi Jinping to Erdogan.

He told the Turkish leader that China has found a development path that fits its own conditions and is now opening up the new journey to comprehensively building a modern socialist country.

China is willing to share its experience in state governance and deepen friendly cooperation with Turkey, said the Chinese diplomat.

Marking the 50th anniversary of the establishment of the diplomatic ties between the two nations, China is ready to make joint efforts with Turkey to implement the important consensus reached by the heads of the two states, and take the bilateral ties onto a track of healthy and stable development, Wang said.

He highlighted the need for the two countries to continue to understand and support each other on the issues related to core interests, and insist on not interfering in each other's domestic affairs.

Wang pledged to continue China's help to Turkey in its fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

He added that, in the context of deepening the synergy between China's Belt and Road Initiative and Turkey's "Middle Corridor" plan, the two nations should strengthen cooperation in the high tech sectors including 5G technology, artificial intelligence, big data and digital economy, and steadily push forward cooperation on major projects to seek win-win results.

Wang promised that China will encourage more Chinese enterprises to import quality products from Turkey and increase their investment in Turkey.

As two important emerging economies, China and Turkey should solidify their unity and cooperate on deepening party communications, safeguarding the development rights of each other, and protecting the common interests of the developing countries, said the Chinese diplomat.

Earlier on March 25, Wang met with his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu.