Turkmen delegation led by Deputy Chairman of the Mejlis (Turkmen Parliament) Kasymguly Babayev held a meeting with the member of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Central Committee of the CPC, Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of the People's Republic of China Li Zhanshu at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing.
According to a Wednesday press release by Turkmen Foreign Ministry, the parties focused on expanding trade-economic and energy cooperation, building industrial facilities, developing cooperation in the areas of communication, transport and logistics and other sectors of the economy, and deepening partnership between the legislative bodies of the two countries.
Turkmenistan and China established diplomatic relations in 1992. Bilateral trade was $4,5 million at that time, while it has reached $8,4 billion in 2018, having increased more than 1,800 times. Since 2011, Chine was the biggest trade partner of Turkmenistan.
Chinese – Turkmen gas cooperation can be described as strategic. China imported more than 250 billion cubic meters of Turkmen gas since the commissioning of Turkmenistan-Uzbekistan-Kazakhstan-China gas pipeline in 2009.
Trade Representative Office under the Embassy of Turkmenistan in the People’s Republic of China (Peking) and representative office of the Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs of Turkmenistan in China opened in 2014 and 2015 respectively.
At present time, container shipments have started by China – Kazakhstan – Turkmenistan – Iran railroad. Delivery time from China to Persian Gulf was reduced from 28 to 14 days while the distance by more than 600 km, which has made the trade between transboundary countries to be more easy and convenient.
