People's Daily, Beijing, May 14 (Reporters Zhu Jingruo, Du Shangze, Pei Guangjiang) President Xi Jinping attended the opening ceremony of the "Belt and Road" International Cooperation Summit Forum on the 14th, and delivered a keynote speech entitled "Working to Promote the Construction of the "Belt and Road", emphasizing the adherence to the Silk Road spirit with peace, cooperation, openness and inclusiveness, mutual learning, and mutual benefit and win-win as the core, and work together to promote the steady and long-term construction of the "Belt and Road", and build the "Belt and Road" into a path of peace, prosperity, openness, innovation and civilization, and move towards a better tomorrow. Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli presided over the opening ceremony.

At 9 a.m., Xi Jinping walked into the venue with warm applause. Zhang Gaoli announced the opening of the "Belt and Road" International Cooperation Summit Forum. Xi Jinping walked onto the rostrum and delivered a speech. Xi Jinping pointed out that the ancient Silk Road has opened a new window for friendly exchanges among all countries, written a new chapter in human development and progress, and accumulated the Silk Road spirit with peace, cooperation, openness and inclusiveness, mutual learning and mutual benefit and win-win as the core. This is a valuable legacy of human civilization.

Xi Jinping stressed that human society is in an era of great development, great changes and great adjustments. The world's multipolarization, economic globalization, social informatization and cultural diversity are developing in depth. The general trend of peaceful development remains strong, and the pace of change and innovation continues to move forward. At the same time, peace deficit, development deficit and governance deficit are severe challenges facing all mankind. In 2013, I proposed to jointly build the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road in Kazakhstan and Indonesia, namely the "Belt and Road" initiative. Over the past four years, more than 100 countries and international organizations around the world have actively supported and participated in the construction of the "Belt and Road", and important resolutions such as the United Nations General Assembly and the United Nations Security Council have also been included in the construction of the "Belt and Road". The construction of the "Belt and Road" has gradually transformed from concepts to actions, from vision to reality, and has achieved fruitful results.

First, policy communication is constantly deepening. The construction of the "Belt and Road" aims to achieve strategic docking and complement each other's advantages. We coordinated policies and docked plans with relevant countries, signed cooperation agreements with more than 40 countries and international organizations, and carried out institutionalized capacity cooperation with more than 30 countries. Second, the facilities are constantly strengthening. At present, a composite infrastructure network is being formed by economic corridors such as China-Pakistan, China-Mongolia-Russia, and the New Eurasian Continental Bridge, land-sea and air channels and information expressways as the framework, and major projects such as railways, ports, and pipelines. Third, trade smoothly continues to improve. From 2014 to 2016, China's total trade volume with countries along the "Belt and Road" exceeded US$3 trillion. China's cumulative investment in countries along the "Belt and Road" has exceeded US$50 billion. Chinese companies have built 56 economic and trade cooperation zones in more than 20 countries, creating nearly US$1.1 billion in tax revenue and 180,000 jobs for relevant countries. Fourth, the capital and financial communications are constantly expanding. China has carried out various forms of financial cooperation with participating countries and organizations. These new financial mechanisms have their own emphasis and complement each other with traditional multilateral financial institutions such as the World Bank, forming a clear-level and initially developed financial cooperation network of the "Belt and Road". Fifth, the mutual understanding between the people is constantly promoting. Participating countries carry out the construction of the Intellectual Silk Road and the Healthy Silk Road, and carry out extensive cooperation in various fields such as science, education, culture, health, and folk exchanges.

Xi Jinping pointed out that the "Belt and Road" initiative follows the trend of the times, adapts to the laws of development, is in line with the interests of people of all countries, and has broad prospects. We must seize the opportunity and follow the trend, promote the steady and long-term development of the "Belt and Road" and move towards a better future.

First, build the "Belt and Road" into a road of peace. We must build a new type of international relations with win-win cooperation as the core, and create a partnership that is not dialogue-free and not alliance-based. All countries should respect each other's sovereignty, dignity, and territorial integrity, respect each other's development path and social system, and respect each other's core interests and major concerns. We must establish a common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security concept and create a security pattern of co-construction and sharing.

Second, build the "Belt and Road" into a road to prosperity. To promote the construction of the "Belt and Road", we must focus on the fundamental issue of development, release the development potential of various countries, and achieve great economic integration, great development linkage, and great sharing of results. We must carry out industrial cooperation in depth; we must establish a stable, sustainable and controllable financial guarantee system, innovate investment and financing models; we must strive to promote the four-in-one connection on land, sea, sky and online, steadily promote the construction of six major economic corridors, build a global energy Internet, and improve the construction of cross-regional logistics networks; we must promote the three-in-one connection of policies, rules and standards.

Third, build the "Belt and Road" into an open road. We must build an open cooperation platform, maintain and develop an open world economy, jointly create an environment conducive to open development, and promote the construction of a fair, reasonable and transparent international economic, trade and investment rules system. We must maintain the multilateral trading system, promote the construction of free trade zones, promote the liberalization and facilitation of trade and investment, focus on solving problems such as development imbalances, governance difficulties, digital divides, and distribution gaps, and build an open, inclusive, inclusive, balanced and win-win economic globalization.

Fourth, build the "Belt and Road" into a path of innovation. We must adhere to innovation-driven development and build the digital Silk Road in the 21st century. We must promote the deep integration of science and technology with industries and science and technology with finance, and create entrepreneurial space and entrepreneurial workshops for young people from all over the world in the Internet era. We must practice the new concept of green development and jointly achieve the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals.

Fifth, build the "Belt and Road" into a path of civilization. We must use civilized exchanges to transcend civilized barriers, mutual learning and conflicts of civilizations, and coexistence and superiority of civilizations, so as to promote mutual understanding, mutual respect and mutual trust among all countries. We must establish a multi-level humanities cooperation mechanism, promote educational cooperation, give full play to the role of think tanks, promote practical cooperation in culture, sports and health, make good use of historical and cultural heritage, and strengthen exchanges in various fields. We must strengthen international anti-corruption cooperation and make the "Belt and Road" a path to integrity.

Xi Jinping stressed that China's development is standing at a new starting point. China will thoroughly implement the development concept of innovation, coordination, greenness, openness and sharing, inject strong impetus into the "Belt and Road" and bring new opportunities for world development. China is willing to develop friendly cooperation with all participating countries in the "Belt and Road" construction on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, and is willing to share development experience with countries around the world, create a new model of win-win cooperation, and build a harmonious coexistence family; it will promote the early launch and early results of pragmatic cooperation projects that have reached agreements; it will increase financial support, add RMB 100 billion to the Silk Road Fund, and encourage financial institutions to carry out RMB overseas fund business, with a scale of expected to be RMB 300 billion; cooperate with other multilateral development institutions such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the BRICS New Development Bank, the World Bank, etc. to support the "Belt and Road" project; it will actively develop with participating countries. For mutually beneficial and win-win economic and trade partnerships, to build a free trade network of the "Belt and Road", China will hold the China International Import Expo from 2018; it is willing to strengthen innovation cooperation with all countries, launch the "Belt and Road" science and technology innovation action plan, carry out four actions: science and technology exchanges, joint laboratories, science and technology park cooperation, and technology transfer; help developing countries and international organizations participating in the construction of the "Belt and Road" to build more people's livelihood projects; it will establish a follow-up liaison mechanism for the "Belt and Road" International Cooperation Summit Forum, establish a financial and economic development research center and promotion center, cooperate to establish a multilateral development financing cooperation center and capacity building center, and create a new platform for humanities cooperation.

Xi Jinping finally pointed out that the construction of the "Belt and Road" is rooted in the historical soil of the Silk Road, focusing on the Asia, Europe and Africa continent, and open to all friends at the same time. The construction of the "Belt and Road" will be discussed by everyone, and the construction results will be shared by everyone. The construction of the "Belt and Road" is a great cause and requires great practice. Let us advance implementation step by step, and achieve results bit by bit to benefit the world and the people. (See the third edition of the speech)

Russian President Putin, Turkish President Erdogan and UN Secretary-General Guterres also delivered speeches at the opening ceremony.

Ma Kai, Wang Huning, Liu Yandong, Liu Qibao, Wang Yang, Meng Jianzhu, Li Zhanshu, Guo Jinlong, Yang Jing, Wang Chen, Yang Jiechi, Guo Shengkun, Wang Yong, Wan Gang, Zhou Xiaochuan, Liang Zhenying and others attended the opening ceremony.

The "Belt and Road" International Cooperation Summit Forum is the highest-level and largest international conference within the framework of the "Belt and Road" construction initiated by China. The theme is "Strengthening international cooperation, jointly building the Belt and Road, and achieving win-win development". It consists of three parts: the opening ceremony, the leaders' roundtable summit, and the high-level meeting. About 1,500 representatives from more than 130 countries and more than 70 international organizations, including 29 foreign heads of state and government, attended the summit forum.

"People's Daily" (Page 01, May 15, 2017)