China and Norway pledged Wednesday to make concerted efforts to further promote bilateral cooperation in various areas.

Chinese Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan and his Norwegian counterpart Thorbjoern Jagland held talks in Beijing Wednesday afternoon in which they both spoke highly of the cooperation between the two countries in international affairs, trade and economy, environment protection, and science and technology.

Tang said the Sino-Norwegian ties have made much progress in recent years, adding that the two sides have maintained contacts at various levels and have established fruitful mechanism of dialogue in the fields of human rights and judiciary.

The Chinese government attaches importance to its relations with Norway and is willing to keep the momentum of high-level mutual visits and to push forward the bilateral friendly cooperation.

Jagland said that the current relationship between his country and China is very good. He said that Norway regards China as an important partner and attaches great importance to China's constructive role in international politics.

Jagland noted that there is still great potential of cooperation between the two countries in the areas of economy and trade, science and technology, and environmental protection.

He said that Norway formulated its new strategy toward China recently and the new strategy stressed Norway's expectation to strengthen political dialogue and economic and trade cooperation with China.

The two foreign ministers also exchanged views on issues concerning the United Nations and other international issues of common interest.

(Xinhua News Agency 06/28/2001)