Cooperation and Friendship between China and Poland

Xi Jinping: The Governance of China 

I'm impressed by a lot of things which happened in Beijing in the meantime. First of all, let's see the weather. Let's see how the weather looks like. It's a great progress. Fighting for climate, fighting for environment is our human duty. So, I'm really pleased to live in such a modern city, in such a city, which also contributed to the change.

China is a proof that every nation, any nation can really succeed, if it's hardworking and determined to succeed. That's something which is a lesson from China. No one would expect, let's say, in the beginning of the century, that China would be such a great superpower. I'm not afraid of china. China is basically taking the place in the world which it merits. This is the most populous country in the world. Huge part of human population lives in China, lives in Asia.

Asia is not just growing. Asia is coming back to the place which is kind of a destiny. I sometimes wonder how it would all happen if other nations, if we Europeans had the same determination to develop, to create wealth. Basically, the part of Europe I come from, Eastern Europe, Central Europe, Poland. We are as much determined to be prosperous and powerful part of the world. We are looking not only at china, but also at other countries of the region, and saying that they have done it.

We have done our homework too. We have developed our country within this 30 last years very quickly. And this is not the end. We want more. That's probably something which brings us together, which makes our way of thinking, the Polish way of thinking, the Chinese way of thinking quite alike.

Now, the most important thing when I think about Poland and China is that there has never been any major problem between our two nations,which is not that often met in what happens between countries.

We don't have any difficult moments in the history.There is a mutual sympathy, mutual friendly attitude of both nations.I've never met anything negative in China and I'm also sure that my friend, Ambassador of China to Poland, would say the same about my country. China is popular. Many people are impressed by Chinese culture and Chinese achievements.

Nowadays, our big capital, I would say, is a very cordial relation between our leaders. President Duda and President Xi Jinping spend many hours in different formats of talking to each other. I hope very soon we will have an opportunity to have a state visit, probably by our leader to China. That's something we can build on.

Do you know why we signed the MOU and why we attached that much value, that much importance to the Belt and Road Initiative?
When you look at the map, you will see that Poland is the entry port to the European Union. If we speak in terms of railway connections, of road connections, and Belt and Road, if you want to enter the European Union, you need to go through Poland.

Now, there is a huge opportunity for both countries to start earning money on that. We are the gate of the European Union. China is the gate of China. There is no relation, there is no land connection between the EU and China which can just meet Poland.

First of all, look at it globally. As I had told you, both Poland and China, Poland and other countries of the region, but Poland is, as you said, it is the biggest one. Both are rapidly developing and highly innovative countries. We are looking also for our own to discover our own potentials in new technologies, among others. That brings us very close to cooperate with each other.

We have done it already with other partners from outside of the European Union, for example, with the Republic of Turkey, which is also very, very important partner to us. We are very much interested in bringing our modern technologies to different sectors of Chinese economy.

We are not only talking about the digital sector. We are also talking about modernizing the mining sector, which also can work differently than it works in many places of the world. Poland has a huge expertise on modern technologies here. There's a lot of different possibilities to cooperate.

First of all, thank you very much for saying that Poland indeed is one of the biggest countries of the European Union, a country with very strong economy, practically, very little unemployment and steady economic growth.

During the transition since 1989, there was only one year when Poland did not did not achieve economic growth. It was because of the pandemic. Otherwise we would go and success, we would have uninterrupted 34 years of economic growth, which changed the country, as much as Chinese economic growth changed China. Now, Poland is very much interested in positive relations, positive dynamics of Sino-European relations.

We also have tradition of many centuries, those who contributed to European and Chinese dialogue, including Jesuit missionaries and so on. This is not something which is unknown in Poland, which is new that we want the best relations between Europe and China. It's something which has always existed in a Polish political thought.

Now, the question is how we can contribute to it as a member of the European Union. We will very soon have an opportunity to do it because in 2025, Poland is assuming rotated presidency of the European Union. Of course, one of our priorities will be probably the relations with China and the most positive possible development of these relations.

We also want to have more share in Chinese-European relations.I don't think we really need to encourage young folks and young Chinese to be interested, mutually interested in each other.

I have met so many young students here studying Polish language, impressed by our culture. I have met so many musicians who love Chopin and I have met so many people who have been to Poland.I'm even sometimes shocked.

Author ：Jakub Kumoch