China South Korea Photo:VCG

China remains the best option for South Korean companies for investment and business opportunities despite the complex global economic environment, Chinese Ambassador to South Korea Xing Haiming said on Monday in a speech at a tech innovation and cooperation meeting between China and South Korea in Seoul. 

In the future, China will maintain consistent and stable domestic and foreign policies, firmly seize the opportunity of high-quality development, and continue to work hand in hand with people from all over the world, including South Korea, to achieve a win-win situation, Xing said, according to a post on the WeChat account of the Chinese Embassy in South Korea on Wednesday.

"China and South Korea are close neighbors that cannot be moved, and are also cooperative partners that have converging interests and mutual benefits," Xing said. He stressed that the Chinese embassy will actively support pragmatic cooperation between cities of the two countries in different aspects, and jointly "write a new chapter in the development of China-South Korea cooperation."

Looking back on the past, under the guidance of the "head-of-state diplomacy," the two sides have maintained close strategic communication, overcome the adverse effects of the economic downturn, jointly maintained the stability of global production and supply chains, and have promoted the economic and trade cooperation between China and South Korea to achieve growth that bucked the downward trend, according to Xing.

The South Korean side said that South Korea and China are good neighbors and good partners, with a long history of friendly exchanges, according to the post. 

An inauguration ceremony for a Wuxi business tech innovation and communication center in Seoul was also held the same day. South Korea is the biggest trading partner and the second-largest foreign investment source for Wuxi in East China's Jiangsu Province.

Wuxi's mayor Zhao Jianjun also said at the event that the Chinese city will deepen pragmatic cooperation with South Korea and strengthen complementary advantages, while prioritizing trade, economic cooperation and cultural exchanges with South Korea. 

The South Korea side also vowed to continue leveraging its advantages in high-tech industrial clusters, and to strive to achieve bigger results in tech communication and cooperation with Wuxi. 

Observers said the event also shed light on the ongoing benign exchanges between localities in China and South Korea, despite concerns over South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol's pro-US policies that have worsened relations with neighboring countries.

South Korea is increasingly facing a predicament amid a lingering export drop. According to recent data published by Reuters, South Korea's exports fell for a seventh straight month in April, dropping by 14.2 percent year-on-year to $49 billion for the month. Last month, South Korea's exports to China dropped by 26.5 percent to $9.52 billion, accounting for a $2.27 billion trade deficit with China, data from Yonhap News Agency showed.