China is willing to discuss with Japan the establishment of free trade area
(FTA), said Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao in Beijing on
Thursday.
Liu was commenting on Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo
Abe's remarks on the establishment of an FTA with China. A Japanese reporter
said Abe was considering the issue, but had concerns about intellectual property
rights (IPR) protection.
Liu said free trade would be conducive to the
long-term stable development of China-Japan economic and trade relations, and
were in the interests of both countries, as economic globalization and regional
integration developed.
It was also in the interests of China to protect
IPR, and the government had taken a series of effective measures and made
important progress in this regard.
The government would take more
administrative and legislative measures to strengthen IPR protection, and was
willing to cooperate with other countries in this field.
(For more biz stories, please visit Industry Updates)