Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos, Jr. delivers his inaugural address as the 17th president of the Philippines at the National Museum in Manila in front of thousands of people on July 1, 2022.Photo:Xinhua

At the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping, Philippines President Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos Jr. will pay a state visit to China from January 3 to 5, 2023, Hua Chunying, spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, announced on Friday. Marcos will be the first foreign head of state received by the Chinese side in 2023, showing the importance attached to China-Philippines relations, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said. 

It will be the first visit of Macros to China as president and his first official visit to a country outside the ASEAN, showing that the two countries highly value the bilateral relationship, Wang Wenbin, spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, told at a routine press conference on Friday. 

During the visit, President Xi will hold a meeting with Marcos, and Premier Li Keqiang and Li Zhanshu, chairman of China's National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, will also meet the Philippine leader. The top leaders of the two countries will discuss and exchange views on bilateral relationship and on regional and global issues, leading the China-Philippines relations toward further development, according to the spokesperson. 

China and the Philippines have seen their relationship make significant progress in recent years, yielding concrete results in various domains and bringing positive energy to regional stability and peace. Since Marcos took office, the two sides have continued insisting on neighborhood friendship and the importance of joint development, Wang said. 

China expects to deepen its friendship with the Philippines and the mutual trust of the two countries during this visit, thus pushing forward cooperation in four key major areas: agriculture, infrastructure, energy and people-to-people exchanges, and ushering in a new "golden age" of China-Philippines friendship, the spokesperson said. 

Xi met with Marcos in Bangkok, Thailand on the sidelines of the APEC meetings in mid-November, and both leaders called for the deepening of cooperation and the enhancement of the China-Philippines ties.

Global Times