Both Shi Guangsheng, China's minister of foreign trade and economic cooperation, and US Trade Representative Robert Zoellick said they will have more talks in the next few days.

Yesterday was the first meeting ever between Shi and Zoellick. The talks took place one day before the 2001 APEC Meeting of Ministers Responsible for Trade (MRT), scheduled to be held today and tomorrow.

The two men met in the morning at the Shanghai International Conference Centre, where Shi and Long Yongtu, deputy foreign trade minister and China's chief trade negotiator, also met their counterparts from other APEC economies in separate bilateral meetings.

The two-day trade minister meeting will be a preparatory conference for an informal gathering of leaders of APEC member economies in October in Shanghai.

Shi told Zoellick that Sino-US economic cooperation should be grounded on mutual understanding and trust and be carried out with an active and practical attitude based on equal consultation.

Zoellick said despite differences, the two countries share a lot of common interests. He said the US side is willing to push forward the growth of bilateral economic ties.

Shi also met Michael Moore, the director-general of the WTO, who will attend the APEC trade minister meeting to brief the participants on preparations for the WTO trade minister meeting in November in Qatar.

Moore said he hoped China can join the trade body before that event.

In his meeting with Shi, Brunei Minister of Industry and Primary Resources Pehin Dato Abdul Rahman Taib said China has laid out a good agenda for the current two-day meeting and he said he believed it will be successful.

After meeting Shi, New Zealand's Jim Sutton, minister of agriculture and trade negotiations, said the Shanghai meetings would have a very important part to play later this year.

"I believe the role played by these Shanghai meetings are going to go down in history as a critical moment," he said.

The 2001 APEC Meeting of Ministers Responsible for Trade raised its curtain this morning under the spotlight of media from home and abroad.

A total of 423 delegates have arrived in Shanghai to take part in the meeting, said He Ning, director of the International Trade and Economic Cooperation Department of the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation.

All 21 APEC member economies have sent ministerial delegations to the meeting, he said at a briefing on the MRT yesterday.

The secretariat of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and the Pacific Economic Cooperation Council will also take part as observers, he added.

The MRT, held every year since 1996, involves trade and economic ministers covering major issues that might have an impact on global and Asia-Pacific trade and economic development.

(China Daily 06/06/2001)