S.Africa assures China of political continuity

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KLEINMOND, South Africa (AFP) — South Africa's Foreign Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma on Friday assured her Chinese counterpart that general elections were unlikely to change her country's political scene.

"New parties have emerged but still we think at the end of elections nothing will change much," Dlamini told Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi speaking of the general elections expected in the second quarter of the year.

The two ministers met outside Cape Town to strengthen ties between their two countries in their fourth encounter in the past 12 months.

Talks between the two nations were to focus on economics and changing global dynamics.

"Both China and South Africa are important developing countries when the international situation is undergoing profound changes and new problems and new challenges keep emerging," said Yang.

He said it was important the two nations meet regularly to deepen the partnership between them.

Yang said the two countries had built up political trust in recent years and thanked South Africa for its cooperation on tricky international issues.


"Our countries conducted close coordination and cooperation in the UN Security Council as regards major international and regional issues and hotspot issues," Yang said before the start of the closed-door meeting.

South Africa has often joined China in blocking the discussion and resolutions around sensitive international issues such as the Zimbabwe crisis and the situation in Myanmar, also known as Burma.

"South Africa gave China valuable support on issues that concern China's core interests including Taiwan and Tibet-related issues."

The two countries also planned further cooperation in dealing with the international financial crisis.

Yang is on the last leg of a four-nation African trip which also took him to Uganda, Rwanda and Malawi.

His visit aims to strengthen relations with African countries, as China seeks to further extend its influence on the resource-rich continent in a relationship that has often drawn criticism from the West.

China has extended billions of dollars in loans towards infrastructure development amongst others to countries such as Sudan which have poor human rights records, obtaining huge oil and gas deals.

South Africa is China's key trading partner in Africa, accounting for 20.8 percent of the total volume of China-Africa trade in 2007 with total trade at some 88 billion rand (8.8 billion US dollars).