At the invitation of Premier of the State Council Li Qiang, Prime Minister of Nepal KP Sharma Oli will pay an official visit to China from December 2 to 5.

China Daily: To follow up on your announcement that Nepal’s Prime Minister Oli will pay an official visit to China. Can you brief us on the program of the visit? How does China view the current China-Nepal relations and what’s China’s expectation for the visit?

Mao Ning: Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli has visited China twice as Nepal’s Prime Minister and made important contributions to advancing the growth of China-Nepal relations. During his upcoming visit, President Xi Jinping will meet with him, and Premier Li Qiang and Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress Zhao Leji will have talks and meet with him respectively. The two countries’ leaders will have in-depth exchanges of views on deepening our traditional friendship, expanding Belt and Road cooperation and exchanges and cooperation in various fields, as well as international and regional issues of mutual interest.

China and Nepal are neighbors with enduring friendship connected by mountains and rivers. Over the past 69 years since China and Nepal established diplomatic relations, despite the changing international and regional landscape, bilateral ties have maintained sound and steady growth, setting a fine example of equality and win-win cooperation between countries of different sizes. In 2019, President Xi Jinping paid a historic state visit to Nepal and the bilateral relationship has been elevated to the strategic partnership of cooperation featuring ever-lasting friendship for development and prosperity. In recent years, the two sides have been earnestly delivering on the important common understandings between leaders of the two countries and achieved fruitful outcomes in our bilateral ties. China stands ready to work with Nepal through Prime Minister Oli’s visit to enhance strategic mutual trust, expand practical cooperation, deepen high-quality Belt and Road cooperation and strive for new progress in China-Nepal strategic partnership of cooperation.

AFP: Sweden said yesterday that it has sent a formal request to China to cooperate with Swedish authorities as they investigate the severing of two cables in the Baltic Sea after a Chinese ship, the Yi Peng 3, was linked to the incident. Can the Foreign Ministry share any updates on this incident or the investigation?

Mao Ning: China stands ready to work with relevant countries to find out what happened. There is ongoing close communication between China and Sweden on this. 

Shenzhen TV: The 2024 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP29, successfully concluded a few days ago and climate governance has become a hot topic. We noted that China is the first country in the world to achieve zero net land degradation and reduce both desertification and sandification. By the end of 2023, China’s forest coverage ratio had exceeded 25 percent with the increase topping the world. How would you comment on China’s achievement in desertification prevention and control and its contribution to the world?

Mao Ning: China is among the countries that suffer most from desertification. The Chinese government attaches great importance to this issue, and has steadily advanced the comprehensive prevention and control of desertification and major ecological conservation projects, such as the Three-North Shelterbelt Forest Program. We have put 53 percent of treatable sandy land under effective treatment, realized a virtuous cycle of ecological conservation and improvement of people’s life, and contributed to the global effort to combat sandification.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of China signing the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD). Over the past three decades, China has taken active effort to implement the convention, carried out international cooperation on combating sandification, and explored mechanisms under Belt and Road cooperation to prevent and control desertification. China has also shared relevant technology and experience and provided training to Central Asian and African countries, which also face the problem of desertification, injecting impetus to the joint pursuit of the Global South for green development.

Next week, COP16 of the UNCCD will be held in Saudi Arabia, and China will send a delegation to the meeting to contribute China’s solutions to global effort to combat desertification and join hands with all parties to make Planet Earth greener. 

Reuters: A Beijing court sentenced Chinese journalist Dong Yuyu to